As summer is winding down, it’s time plan your North American public art and public space travel schedule. Here is my selection.
Burning Man, north of Reno, Nevada, 21 Years in Different Forms
August 27 to September 3, 2007
The giant performance and installation event in the Black Rock desert. Bring your tent and your caffeine to stay up for many nights. (The Burning Man website has an excellent archive.)
Another amazing temple by David Best and friends. (If you don’t know Best’s temple for plywood cutouts, search Google Images with “David Best Temple”
New comer Mike Ross’ Big Rig Jig
Nuit Blanche, Year Two, Toronto, Saturday Night, September 29, 2007
One all night party starting at 7:03 PM to sunrise with more than 100 exhibitions, performances, installations, tours and open galleries. 450,000 people attended last year. As opposed to all the lame websites for the major exhibitions in Europe this summer, check on the documentary website from the 2006 Nuit Blanche. Completely comprehensive, on-line archive with photographs and videos. A new model for the arts festivals.
New York City Open House, Year Five, October 5 & 6, 2007
Inspired by the London Open House (Sept 15-16), numerous buildings, parks and offices are open to the public. Special tours and events highlight the qualities of New York City urban design, architecture and public space. In 2006, more than 180 sites were open and 75,000 people participated.
Thom Sokoloski has managed to borrow the southern tip of Roosevelt Island in the East River for a modified installation of his illuminated tents. First introduced in Paris five years ago and then last year in Toronto’s Nuit Blanche the work explored the history of mental health. In New York, “The Encampment” will be a “metaphorical archaeological dig into a community’s collective memory” with the expression of “of those memories within each of the tents,” according to the artist.
Sculpture in Public, Seattle, October 15-17, 2007
The annual Sculpture Magazine conference features tours of the new sculpture park (See the excellent comprehensive story by Clair Enlow in August issue of Landscape Magazine) and most of the other major outdoor public art in the Seattle metro.
Art Basel – Miami, Year Five, December 6 – 9, 2007
The events start throughout the city days before the opening of the Convention Center with its 200 galleries and 40,000 visitors. Big mob party of beautiful people is in the Design District on Thursday night. Many organizations are renting spaces and holding exhibitions and happenings. After a couple of years of “weak” outdoors sculpture in Miami Beach, the lovely Fairchild Botanical Tropical Garden in Coral Gables will present a sculpture exhibition. I hope for better results. Check the websites in October of the schedules.
“Living Room” by Behar and Marquardt in the Miami Design District
Fairchild Tropical Garden
Public Art, Public Space
From Roy Tamboli
These are interesting events and I have participated in some of them. It occcurred to me while looking at these projects together and thinking about the art world today that big production art has become as impersonal as the corporate culture I loathe.