A Kansas City artist wanted a new direction. It led to a giant sunflower in Prairie Village

PO1 William "Chip" Nagel
..."For most of her professional career, Amie Jacobsen was a graphic designer, painter and children’s book illustrator. Then, about seven years ago, she decided to take up welding.

"From the time I was a little kid," she said, "all I thought was, you know, I was gonna be an artist."

Three people, two women and a man, stand around several large, steel tables that hold different metal parts for a large sculpture.

Amie Jacobsen, right, stands around some of the steel components with her team, Megan Bryde, left, and Kai Huffhines inside Jacobsen's studio in Independence.
Jacobsen moved to the Kansas City metro area in 2007. Originally from Colorado, she studied studio art and painting in college there before moving with two young kids to Georgia to earn an MFA in illustration at Savannah College of Art and Design.

Here, she taught online classes, illustrated children’s books and created paintings for galleries.

"At some point," she said, "I was just getting burnt out."

Searching for a new direction, she was watching a local arts show on Kansas City PBS when inspiration struck.

"I saw a shop on Arts Upload on the public TV station one night (when I was) working on an illustration," she said, "and it was called Machine Head, owned by Dick Jobe."

So she called Jobe, who ran the fabrication shop in the Crossroads Arts District, to see if he had some ideas about where she could learn to weld.

"He just was really kind and said, 'Well, I take interns sometimes. Why don't you come down and you can run errands for me and, you know, and I'll teach you some welding.'"...