Page 32 - Studio International - October 1972

John Panting states that 'I didn't really consider (originally part of the 'Sculpture in competition among artists for sculpture on
the nature of the opportunity as being other Environment' exhibition in 1967) is successful public sites in the uptown West Side of
than a chance to extend my own experience of in this respect : although the artist is unhappy at New York City, the Washington
sculpture'. The Foundation's funds seem to the posters and slogans on it, they do no harm; Heights-Inwood-Marble Hills area. The list of
have been regarded as just another handout by students lounge under and kids rotate the cube, possible sites, which was announced to the
artists who regarded themselves as too smart to balanced on one point. It has become a part of artists, had been prepared by the communities
be taken in by the optimistic programme. the pattern of leisure there. themselves on the assumption that residency is a
Liliane Lijn's statement is a classic of the Karl Deutsch has commented that 'autonomy better preparation for siting public work than
derealization of sculptors' sensibility. After her involves . . . the feeding back of a stream of data abstract design principles. The project was
work was installed, 'the result was that the recalled from memory upon a stream of data sponsored not only by the Municipal Art Society
environment itself seemed to lose its concrete regarding current behaviour. The points at but by the New York City Department of
reality, the sculpture remaining what it was which these two kinds of communication Cultural Affairs and the Mayor's Neighbourhood
envisioned'. Well, congratulations, Miss Lijn, channels meet are strategic points in the decision Action Programme (NAP). Thus neighbourhood
and good-bye world out there. In all these system'.5 Memory, for the formalist sculptor, involvement began with the project rather than
statements very simple views of the autonomy consists of recall of a definite group of being solicited later.
of the artist and the work are maintained which, precedents and models, the prestige of which Twelve of the 6o proposals were selected by a
so far as public sculpture is concerned, is like over-rides the input from current behaviour. joint committee of community representatives
talking Welsh on prime time. Current behaviour includes the area of public and art world professionals, a mixture aimed to
The general attitude towards vandalism is in sculpture inasmuch as the audience is an secure decisions based on local expertise and
accord with the nostalgic defence of 'artistic unknown present factor untouched by the usual disinterested aesthetic judgment. The selected
licence' in these quoted statements. It is usually conditioning and reinforcement that the proposals were circulated in the recipient
described in terms that derive from the sub-group for art receives and which the artist neighbourhoods in the form of models and
nineteenth-century concept of philistinism counts on. To the extent that a sculptor visualizations where residents voted on them in
(hostile crowd versus sensitive individual), so dismisses this audience he is rejecting public art order of preference. Thus community
that a sculptor whose work gets manhandled in relation to current behaviour. It takes more participation was continuous from initial site
knows the pang ofgood old-fashioned alienation. than an outdoor site to make sculpture public. selection, to the filtering of the send-in, and final
My own feeling is that the artists are responsible The target of public art is the achievement of a decisions about which works would be realized.
for what impulses to graffiti and damage their focusing point for an undifferentiated audience. The first five choices of the community were
works trigger off in passers-by. I propose here The problem is to mobilize ideas and values by Eduardo Ramirez, Inverna Lockpez, Clement
Alloway's laws of public sculpture. i. If a work means of imagery in the way that biblical and Meadmore, Richard Hamner and Terry
can be reached it will be defaced. 2. If the classical allusion functioned until the end of the Fugate-Wilcox. The Art Commission, a city
subsequent changes reduce the level of nineteenth century. agency charged with overseeing urban design
information of the work, it was not a public work It is my impression that the importation of from park benches to monumental sculpture,
to start with. The requirements of public existing sculptures into public spots is objected to Lockpez's and Hamner's
sculpture, therefore, are not the same as for inconsequential in effect. The 'Sculpture in environmental pieces, but later withdrew the
gallery- or museum-bound pieces. A public Environment' show in New York neither objection to Hamner. In this incident the
sculpture should be invulnerable or inaccessible. inspired the citizens nor impeded the flow of artists involved were supported by the
It should have the material strength to resist traffic. 'City Sculpture', to judge from the community against the city agency, which
attack or be easily cleanable, but it also needs a literature, was subject to a mixture of optimistic suggests that the approach is soundly based.
formal structure that is not wrecked by organizers and participants declining to be This social shifting of the basis of public
alterations. One defence of public sculpture drafted. The result was an uneasy interface sculpture, so that the community is brought in
could be a high level of redundancy which between what each artist does anyway and an as a client, may be the way in which the absence
would incorporate lavatory seats and sprayed expanded range of sites. This year the Venice of a shared iconography can be overcome in
slogans and all that into the structure.3 Biennale had a section, out of the gardens, terms of shared projects. q
Public works of art can be classified as devoted to Scultura nella Cita' which brought
successes only if they incorporate or resist into the open the fallacies lurking in the other
unsolicited additions and subtractions. exhibitions. A scatter of modern sculpture was
Newman's Broken Obelisk collected 'God is love' put around the city; the pieces looked stranded
and other messages when it was on the plaza of and isolated, desolate and affected in an
the Seagram Building in 1967. These had to be environment already self-sufficient in terms of
sandblasted off the corten surface. When the art and urban design. The ideal of public service
sculpture was installed in Houston, Texas, it in the absence of a public iconography or public 'Aloisio Magalhaes. Der Weg Eines Zeichens. Nachwort
was placed in the centre of an ornamental pool. interest cannot give public sculpture relevance. Max Bense. Edition Rot no. 39, Stuttgart, 1969.
It is safe from graffiti presumably, but at some It is in this context that a recent project of the 'Studio International. July/August, 1972. Turnbull
p. 23; subsequent quotations from artists,
cost: the connection of the pyramid with the Public Arts Council is significant; it proposes pp. 25, 27, 26.
earth has been sacrificed by the cutback nothing less than a realignment of the art/public 'Another solution to the problem of public sculpture
underwater support which gives an effect of relationship. is expendability: however, I am deferring here to the
convention of solid materials and longish duration as
suspension that exaggerates the lower lip of the Usually a sculpture is inserted readymade into the proper state of sculpture. Nonetheless, loose,
sculpture. Conclusion: despite its vivid an available space and its unveiling is the first scattered, changeable, growing pieces, with
anticipated temporal limits, should not be left out of
manipulation of the forms of public sculpture contact we have with a work supposedly account.
(the pyramid, an inverted obelisk), it is not intended for the public. The Public Arts 4Reproduced in Studio International, op. cit. p. 13;
suitable for an unregulated place. Since no work Council, which is part of the Municipal Art Newman's Broken Obelisk in the Seagram Plaza is
also reproduced here.
of art can be expected to be protected by its Society, a non-profit civic organization in New 'Karl W. Deutsch. 'Self-Referent Symbols and
`sacredness', it is up to the artists to figure out York with a private membership, has conceived Self-Referent Communication Patterns' in Symbols
systems to deflect or absorb post-terminal traces a way to break this pattern. The Council and Values: an Initial Study, eds. Lyman Bryson, et
(i.e. activity following completion by the artist). initiated an Environmental Sculpture al. The Conference on Science, Philosophy, and
Religion. Distributed by Harper and Brothers, New
Bernard Rosenthal's Alamo4 in Astor Place Programme, which took the form of a York and London, 1954. p. 624.
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