Tim. Thanks for the thoughts about Benjamin Bufano from San Francisco. I just threw out the idea of vernacular public art without understanding where it is going. Vernacular is something that appears to sprout from the place and feels so at home that most travelers ignore it. But art requires a little uncomfortable sand in the face. Your definition of vernacular is to merge with the life of the place. The art is USED. But not to sit on and not to look at, but for the natural imagination of humans. The imaginative use is performed by … [Read more...]

Touching on an idea that demands more examination, should we start to think about public art as vernacular? Do we commission so much public art that cultural integration should be prioritized in the same manner of vernacular architecture? As a starting point, check out Lincoln Road, a pedestrians-only roadway in Miami Beach. Lincoln Road is packed with cafes, tables, awnings, signs, lights and people. When the road was closed in 1960, the great master of Miami Beach architecture - Morris Lapidus - designed a series of artistic follies. … [Read more...]

The streetscape - sidewalks, trees, benches, cafes, building facades - is the world's number urban renewal project. How many thousands of miles or kilometers are rebuilt each year to invigorate neighborhoods here, there and almost everywhere? As with all global movements, the differences can be minute. Yet, every city declares their streetscape a strict response to local culture making the space unique to XXXXXX neighborhood. In addition to whatever visual symbols exist or can be invented locally, nature can make a difference in the palette … [Read more...]

In some chairs in some room in New York City in 1980s, Kyong Park and I discussed a guerilla project to block out all the street signs in a section of Manhattan. In a few hours could we paint over every name: 33rd, 32nd, 31st.....? Would a traffic jam ensue in the morning? Would the government of New York respond like an emergency or just let it be until the streets department replaced them in a few weeks. What is the relationship between phenomena geography and the signed geography? In general, the new or infrequent visitor exhibits … [Read more...]

Domus Magazine in Italy thought the Jinhua Architecture Park was so hip, that they published the park before anything was really complete in July 2006. "a+u" magazine in Tokyo published the suburban park of architectural follies in December 2006. Herzog & de Meuron Cataloguing a creative moment in architecture has rarely been done outside of temporary world fairs or biennales. The park is guaranteed to be "dated" within a few years. But dating may be a major technique to preserve difference in the future unified globe with its standard … [Read more...]

"Danger, Will Robinson" squawked the robot. Now, I walk into the danger of critiquing something I have never seen, but many others have - the Sleepwalkers video projections by Doug Aitken on MoMA in NYC. But projecting yourself into the reality of some other place is a primary function of this Blog and is the virtual/physical internal struggle of the Internet itself. This entry is caused by comments sent to me by Tim Barrus of Cinematheque Films. Barrus produces video art on YouTube. The comments from Barrus, myself and AJ blogger Tyler … [Read more...]

Surfing the web for five years as a public art consultant, I noticed that nothing exists that keeps interested parties informed on public art or public space that is not pure reporting or academic analysis. Where was the something in the middle - arts journal criticism? Something that focuses on the visual? Something that understands the silly institutional traps? I live in Florida. The sun shines and the brain shrinks. We live with our bodies and our eyes. Warmth and color. We like the emerging event - the energy. Nothing dies in … [Read more...]

On January 29, 2007, Marvin Finn died at the age of 89 in Louisville, Kentucky. I have never heard of Finn before. A notice came to me via Google's daily alert. His obituary included one "public art" project made during his 86th year. In the Courier-Journal, Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson praised Finn's legacy, calling him "one of Louisville's greatest folk artists." I love this statement. Not America's, not Kentucky's, not African-American, but Louisville's. In many ways, our art and design bureaucracies have turned away from local pride … [Read more...]