Vincent, Waiting for Alice

In SW Portland's Pendleton Park, a giant 8' rabbit statue watches over the playground. This is Vincent, Waiting for Alice. It's yet another Keith Jellum sculpture; at this point I've lost track of how many of those I've covered here. I'm honestly not seeking them out particularly, but I keep running into them everywhere, all the time. In any case, he has a blurb about Vincent, Waiting for Alice on its RACC page:

In Louis Carroll's “Alice in Wonderland,” Alice is lured into her journey by the site of a white rabbit that keeps dashing out of sight, just beyond her reach. At one point in the tale, Alice finally encounters the white rabbit that is late for a party given by the duchess. However, the rabbit has misplaced its gloves and fan and sends Alice to retrieve them. As an adult, I still delight in the playfulness of this story and see it as a metaphor for pursuing one's dreams - even when the dream seems beyond one's reach. May your imaginations run wild in the pursuit of dreams!

Designing a giant Lewis Carroll rabbit is probably harder than it sounds; you have to avoid anything that remotely resembles a character from the Disney version, because lawyers, or any Warner Bros. rabbit character, because other lawyers, and you also have to avoid making a terrifying Donnie Darko rabbit. Ok, a scary Donnie Darko rabbit statue actually sounds kind of awesome, but there would be Concerned Neighborhood Parents if you tried that, especially in this part of town. And then you'd get insufferable indie film dudes making pilgrimages here from across the globe, bored significant others in tow, which is not exactly an improvement over neighborhood kids having a normal fun day at the park.

I don't really have any more material about this particular rabbit, but YouTube is full of random video clips about giant rabbits, Carroll-esque or otherwise, so here's a brief selection.

Dr. McCoy's run-in with a giant Alice in Wonderland rabbit (which is actually a robot), from the original Star Trek episode Shore Leave

Donnie Darko:

The aforementioned Donnie Darko rabbit. Apparently he's named "Frank".

"White Rabbit", the Jefferson Airplane song. (Pssst! It's about drugs! *clutches pearls*)

And, most terrifyingly of all, a bit of vintage Easter ragtime piano from the Lawrence Welk show, because the 70s were a dark and primitive time.