An artist’s dream crumbles to dust.
Jon
“The Castle” is slowly reaching up to the sky on Red Mountain in Rougemont, North Carolina. The small-scale Castle will be sheathed in white marble and cream-colored North Carolina stone. A great part of the interior space is devoted to sculpture studios, painting studios, and foundry. The design and the construction is taking place simultaneously. It’s a great creative experience! The Castle will function as a gallery, studio, home and canvas for many years to come.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njAEUMK81ro
The work of local artist Robert Mihaly, the outsider’s castle sits at the end of a long mountain road past innocuous houses and trailers. The sculptor built the marble and cinder block structure to serve as his part-time studio and home. It is constructed in a mash-up of styles ranging from European-styled towers to fantastical Middle-East-inspired minarets and cupolas which are covered in copper. Unfortunately, while most of the exterior was completed, the interior was left unfinished after the death of Mihaly’s beloved wife.
Since the site has been abandoned, it has become a haven for graffiti artists who have marked up most of the interior. The wooden floors are rotting and unstable and the natural debris that has blown in from the broken windows covers most of the floor. It is rumored that Mihaly still uses the Castle Mont Rouge as a part-time studio despite its current state of disrepair.
In Spring 2014, the artist started a Kickstarter to raise enough money to renovate the castle; however, as of September 2014, the castle remains in its state of abandoned disrepair.
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