Perched on a cliff edge in South Dakota, 17 bronze horse and bison sculptures stand out on an otherwise nondescript landscape. The artwork was not meant to be quite so out of place: it was planned as the centrepiece for a $100 million resort owned by Kevin Costner.
Despite Costner sketching plans two decades ago, the resort never opened - and now the artist is suing the star for breach of contract.
It took Peggy Detmers nine years to finish the $4 million piece for the Dunbar resort - named after Costner's character in Dances with Wolves.
During that time she claims she had to turn down other commissions and so missed opportunities, leading to a loss in her business. She is now facing the Hollywood actor in South Dakota Supreme Court over the contract they signed in 2000. In the contract, Costner promised to either build the resort by 2010, put the sculptures in another agreed upon place or sell them and split the profits.
Kevin Costner told artist Peggy Detmers (left) that he had planned to build a hotel, golf course and winter sports facilities at the 1,000 acre resort in South Dakota
His lawyers claim he met these terms by displaying the work at a visitor center - now a tourist hot spot - on land intended for the resort.
'Mr. Costner isn't the first person to come to Deadwood with big dreams that didn't come true,' mayor Francis Toscana told the Wall Street Journal.
When Costner approached Detmers in 1994, she was holding regular exhibitions at international wildlife shows.
During one of their first meetings, the actor showed her plans for a luxury hotel, golf course and winter sports facilities, she told the Journal. The plan also featured an old-fashioned train to take visitors form the Rapid City airport to the 1,000-acre resort.
To meet his budget, she agreed to create the work for $250,000 - just a quarter of her usual rate.
She said she was happy with this cut down rate because she expected to sell smaller copies of the works at the resort - and Costner said he would market these.
'I said, "This is a done deal, right? Because I'm taking a huge risk here",' Ms. Detmers said, aware it would bite into time for other projects.
In total, he paid her $310,000, according to court records, and promised to put the work on display by 2003.
He opened Tatanka: Story of the Bison, an interactive visitor centre, in June 2003, to display the structure at the Dunbar resort. While he had allegedly promised to market copies of the artwork, no sales have been made and Detmers says she now has nothing.
With the resort still on hold in 2010, she eventually took Costner to court, where a judge ruled she had agreed to the Tatanka site by helping with the installation. Detmers claimed she never agreed to the site, and is now appealing this decision, appearing in court on Monday.
