THIS fish story, which is not about bragging men in rubber boots, and does not involve lengthy discussions of lures and lakes and fish this big, is actually true.
Baltimore's "Fish out of Water" sculptures have been cropping up on sidewalks around the city since late April. If you haven't seen any of them, we're sorry, and we wonder where you've been. Because this school of fish is now 120 or so strong (and there are just as many fish puns floating about town, it seems).
Following is everything you never knew you wanted to know about the finny creatures. All true.
The fish lady
A woman named Leslie Landsman is, above all, the one responsible for Baltimore's fish. (Follow along here. Credit must be given where credit is due.) This was her idea. She saw Chicago's cow sculptures on NBC's Today show. She thought Cows on Parade was "the coolest thing ever." She wanted to do something like that in Baltimore.
Landsman went to City Councilwoman Catherine Pugh. Pugh went to Mayor Martin O'Malley, who gave the idea his OK.
He, Mayor Martin O'Malley, is the one to blame for the fish puns.
"Let's go fishing," he said when he approved the plan.
The Downtown Partnership got involved. Landsman went to work. A model fish was constructed of gray fiberglass by Steven Weitzman of Weitzman Studios in Brentwood. Plans were made to spawn the model. Artists were contacted to submit designs for the fishes. Sponsors signed on to fund the project. There was laughter, there were tears.
Seriously.
"There are so many challenges," says Landsman, who admits the fish have made her cry on more than one occasion. "It gets to be overwhelming sometimes, juggling the sponsors and juggling the artists. Sometimes they mix well, sometimes they don't."
More fiberglass fish were made -- 200, to be exact. One hundred and twenty of those fish were sponsored, decorated and installed. More are on the way.
Landsman, now the creative director of Fish out of Water, loves each and every fish.
"They're like my children or something," she says.
She visits the Inner Harbor-area fish sculptures every day because she works nearby at the National Aquarium, where she is director of volunteer services. Her office has lots of windows. She calls it a fishbowl.
Leslie Landsman does not eat fish at home.
The fish are this big
