Joan of Arc makes dazzling return to Kelly Drive

At 11:05 this morning, a small group of people standing near 25th Street and Kelly Drive, began to beam.

"Is it done?" wondered Margot Berg.

"Yeah," responded Kate Brockman.

"Should we shout, 'Vive la France'?" Berg joked.

They both looked up at the now-dazzling gold of a completely regilded, repaired and reinstalled Joan of Arc sculpture, finally back home after a nearly a nine-month stint in rehab.

Joan, in her shimmering solar state, is something you notice.

Drivers passing the flatbed truck and cranes that nudged the two-to-three-ton piece back onto its pedestal honked their horns.

A group in a car headed up Kelly Drive cheered.

Residents of the Philadelphian condo building gazed down at the workers and sculpture with obvious pleasure - they once can again tell their visitors to "turn at Joan of Arc."

Adam Jenkins, a conservator with Milner & Carr Conservation L.L. P, the firm that regilded and repaired the city-owned sculpture, said reinstallation went without a hitch.

Berg, head of the city's public art program, said Joan looked terrific.

"She's in spectacular shape, so dramatic," Berg said, gazing up at the shimmering golden image of Joan bearing a standard and battle flag on horseback.

At 4 p.m. Thursday, the sculpture - created by French artist Emmanuel Frémiet and bestowed on Philadelphia by French residents here in 1890 - will be rededicated at a ceremony attended by Mayor Nutter and members of the Philadelphia Chapter of the French Heritage Society, among others.

The society, which was instrumental in bringing the piece here in the first place, raised $15,000 toward the conservation project. The city provided another $50,000.