Legacy is something we all think about. Whether we know what we want to do or not, we like to think about leaving our mark on the world, our communities, or even just our school. Graduate Shelby Neeley, however, is actively starting that legacy with her most recent project with Amplify Arts for the Omaha Public Library.
“If you told 12-year-old me with her nose buried in whatever library book she was reading, I think she’d probably cry,” Neeley said.
Neeley got her humble start in the library as an aide at Millard South. Here she started making sculptures of animals and objects out of books that were going to be thrown away otherwise. This sparked quite a passion project for her, as she fell in love with multimedia art.
“My time as a library aide was deeply important to me,” Neeley said, “It was quite the Hail Mary on my part to get accepted for this program,” Her projects ranged from birds, to the giant shoe still have at the library’s entrance.
“Her dad, Dan Neeley, and I have been excited to watch her growth as an artist,” Jill Neeley, Shelby’s mother, said. “Both of us have zero artistic ability so we’ve always wondered where it came from!”
Shelby’s current project for the Central branch of the Omaha Public Library is arguably the biggest and most inspiring. She is currently working on a colorful array of Nebraska birds– 15 of them to be exact –that are all life sized.
“They’re all actual birds you could see in your day-to-day life,” Neeley said, “I am making them out of paper mache– specifically out of old books.”
Her progress is moving along well and she had just finished her 7th bird in total, a whooping crane that stands 5 feet high with a 9-foot-wingspan. She goes on to describe how proud of the project she is, calling it her “most impressive to date.” Each project for the Central Library is just as impressive, and shows each of the artists’ diversity and passion.
“The continuation of the project has been interesting, seeing her art work and skills progress, wondering if she can turn a hobby into a career or of seeing if she will stick with it,” Jill Neeley said.
The applicants to this program were selected on a basis of creativity and community engagement with a meaningful connection to libraries as a whole.
In an interview with Melissa Wurth, the director of the program through Amplify Arts, we find out why this program is so incredibly important to Omaha. The new Central Library will be serving as a central hub of creativity and learning, and Shelby’s work will be on display for the hundreds that walk the halls of the new building serving as inspiration and a testament to creativity as a whole.
Overall this project is exactly what Neeley was looking for, and she has put forth all she has for it. The legacy she left here at Millard South is large, but compared to the one she will be leaving on Omaha as a whole is even greater. Shelby’s art will be on display starting in Spring of 2026 when the Central Library is set to open.
