Why the 'nightmare witch' overlooking Port Royal is moving to a new home

She stands 12 feet tall.

Black rubber hair flows down her back.

She holds a leaf-shaped shield in one hand and the other is raised as if to say "stop."

The sculpture has stood for more than a decade to catch the eye of drivers who might otherwise cruise past Port Royal.

And now the town plans to relocate its leading lady.

Town officials plan to overhaul town's entryway for a fresh new look that will coincide with an expected rush of new growth and activity throughout one if its main thoroughfares.

The art has no obvious connection to a town that traces its history to 16th-century Spanish settlers and has been an industrial port and fishing village. But she's hard to miss.

"Love her or hate her, everybody knows where she is," town manager Van Willis said. "It did get some attention, you've just got to switch things up from time to time."

The piece was called "Mother of Rubber Trees" and created by Dessa Kirk for an exhibit in Chicago in 2000. Port Royal acquired the exhibit the next year and some of the pieces can still be found throughout town.

A stone fish lurks behind town hall.

A rusting, twisted metal collection of Amazon River animals greets visitors at Naval Heritage Park, which hosts a weekly farmers market and includes a playground and skatepark.

Willis renamed the entry sculpture "Zephyr," and she was anchored to a wooden platform behind a sign at Ribaut Road and Paris Avenue in 2007 to alert visitors to Port Royal's Old Village area..

As new restaurants open in Port Royal and more development is planned at the former state port terminal, town officials plan to add a new logo and paint to the main sign. Additional signs planned for a traffic light post on the opposite corner will direct people to shops and restaurants.

The new look will reflect new branding the town commissioned in 2014, which gave the town a new anchor logo and tagline "Cool, Coastal, Far From Ordinary."

Sign plans will go through the town's Redevelopment Commission, and the process could take up to six weeks.

The lady sculpture will join other art and move to another area of town to still be determined.

She has been called "Nightmare Witch" and "Heisman Medusa," for her pose similar to college football's famous trophy.

Kirk created the sculpture after learning of an Amazon forest spirit who protects rubber trees from overharvesting., she told the Chicago Tribune in 2000. The lady is made of recycled steel, her hair of old truck tires and her face and hands were molded after Kirk's, she told the Tribune.

The woman's pose is to say "don't take too much," the newspaper reported at the time.

"I identified with it spiritually and as a woman," Kirk told the newspaper. "I'm 26 and I'm evolving as a human. When people grow up, it seems like things cut a little deep, and you learn moderation. You still have to be available for people but you acquire better boundaries."

This story was originally published May 1, 2018 at 3:53 PM with the headline "Why the 'nightmare witch' overlooking Port Royal is moving to a new home."