Public Art Conference Archive—2001

Public Art Tour Descriptions

42nd Street and Times Square
Tour Leader: Jennifer McGregor, Wave Hill, Bronx, NY
Explore the changing meaning of public space by traveling from the 19th Century into the 21st Century. Our walk begins at the United Nations complex along the East River and continues to the fabulously renovated Grand Central Terminal. Pop into buildings and explore public spaces along the way including the Chrysler Building, Whitney Museum of American Art at Philip Morris, New York Public Library, and Bryant Park. Observe the influence of business improvement districts on streetscape design and management, and the shift from art and architecture to the influence of advertising and commerce concluding with a grand finale of Times Square.

African American Burial Ground/Federal Building
Tour Leaders: Lorraine Haucke, U.S. General Services Administration, New York, NY, and Adrian Sas, New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, NY, NY.
The tour will begin at the Federal Office Building. Dr. Sherril Wilson, Director of the African Burial Ground Project will share information about the history of the site, and discuss works in the interior of the building: "America Song," Clyde Lynds; "Africa Rising," Barbara Chase-Riboud; "The New Ring Shout," Houston Conwill Joseph DePace and Estella Conwill Majozo; "Renewal," Tomie Arai; and "Untitled," Roger Brown. Dr. Wilson will also discuss the African Burial Ground exterior site where we anticipate an additional commission and memorialization. Artist Tomie Arai will discuss her work at the site. The tour continues with visits to:

• Foley Square, to see Triumph of the Human Spirit, 2000, by Lorenzo Pace and Bronze Medallions, 2000 by Rebecca Darr. Geoffrey Roesch of R G Roesch Architecture & Landscape Architecture will talk about the reconstruction of Foley Square. He will focus on the six year process that yielded the towering granite sculpture and five bronze medallions illustrating the history of the surrounding neighborhood.
• The Jacob Javits Federal Building to view Manhattan Sentinels, Beverly Pepper, Object in Five Planes, by Alexander Calder, Metropolis, by Seymour Fogel and the plaza designed by Martha Schwarz on the former site of Richard Serra's Tilted Arc.
• The Moynihan Courthouse to view Sounding Stones by Maya Lin.

Hugh L. Carey Battery Park City
Tour Leader: Joyce Pomeroy Schwartz, Works of Art for Public Spaces, Ltd., NY, NY
This tour of Hugh L. Carey Battery Park City Authority Public Art Projects will discuss the of the commissioning process of the Irish Hunger Memorial, tour permanent projects, and a review past projects in the park, including Creative Times Art On The Beach. The tour will focus on the history and process of creating urban public art as new vital landmarks for cities undergoing urban revitalization. Artist Brian Tolle, who won the Irish Hunger Memorial competition with 1100 Architect and Landscape Architect Gail Eileen Wittwer, will be on site to answer questions about the project. This competition was an artist-generated collaboration. The artists selected the architects and landscape architects they wished to work with to develop concepts for the project. Artist Tom Otterness will meet the group to tour his project. Artist Agnes Denes will also meet the group at the original site of Wheatfield, a project of 2 acres of wheat planted in the shadow of the World Trade Center, to discuss this pivitol public art project. A Tour of Permanent Projects Includes:

• Tom Otterness, The Real World, 1992
• Demetri Porphyrios, The Pavilion, 1992
• Ann Hamilton and Michael Von Valkenburg, Park Design
• Martin Puryear, Pylons, 1995
• Siah Armijani, Scott Burton, Cesar Pelli & M.Paul Friedberg, World Financial Plaza, 1986
• Ned Smyth, The Upper Room, 1987
• R.M. Fischer, Rectorgate, 1988
• Richard Artschwager, Sitting/Stance,1988
• Mary Miss, South Cove, 1989
• Jim Dine Ape & Catat, The Dance, 1993
• Louise Bourgeoise, The Welcoming Hands, 1996
• Tony Cragg, Resonating Bodies, 1996

Harlem
Tour Leader Maria Dominguez, El Museo del Barrio, New York, NY
From community-based murals to the Malcom X memorials at the Audubon Ballroom, this tour of Harlem will be a jump-start into this diverse, vibrant and historic neighborhood. Check the tour sign-up board for an updated description.

Lower East Side
Tour Leader: Susan Fleminger, Abrons Art Center, New York, NY
The Lower East Side has long been a home for artists and a diverse cultural community. It is an energized part of NYC where innovative public art proejcts thrive. This tour will walk though the neighborhood's murals, gardens and galleries, including the Abrons Art Center of Henry Street Settlement, and give participants the opportunity to meet some Lower East Side artists.

Lower Manhattan and Historic Battery Park
Tour Leader: Jenny Dixon, Bronx Museum of Art, Bronx, NY
Historic Battery Park is where New York City begins. Built partially on a land fill, the park has a wonderful history and has become the site for numerous memorials ranging from the monolithic World War II Memorial, to quieter works honoring different immigrant groups. In the not so distant past, Battery Park had been referred to as a dumping ground for public art. Plans to alter this perception exist on the drawing boards. In fact, the park could serve as a public art primer, representing different late nineteenth - early twentieth century public art in context with contemporary work. Upon entering the Park, the tour will be spent ambling gently through the grounds and viewing at least a dozen works of art.

With the redevelopment of lower Manhattan, led in part by the Battery Park City Authority, recent works have been added to the Park. s quirky collection. These include the Merchant Marine Memorial by Marisol Escobar, the Korean War Memorial by Mac Adams, and a fence by Wopo Holup. The fence was installed in June of 2000 and depicts en ecological history of the Hudson River. Serving as both a metaphorical and actual barrier, the fence separates the island of Manhattan from New York Harbor. It is here at the most southern point of the park that one has wonderful views of the Statue of Liberty. Additionally, the park has been the site of numerous temporary exhibitions: a program is currently run the New York City Parks Department, and an installation will be on view.

Ms. Dixon has lived or worked in lower Manhattan for over twenty years, and served on the local community board for 12 years. From this vantage point, Ms. Dixon will provide a brief historical overview of the park and the different public/private partnerships that are working together to further transform the park. Having served on the panels for the projects realized by Marisol Escobar, Mac Adams and Wopo Holup, she will also discuss the different selection processes involved with each commission and the nature of the commissioning agencies.

New York City Schools
Tour Leader: Michele Cohen, Public Art for Public Schools, Long Island City, NY  
Tour participants will visit a selection of historic and contemporary NYC Manhattan schools and will see public art projects dating from the 1930s to the present. Conservation will be discussed where appropriate. Sites include:

• Liberty High School, 250 West 18 Street, Liberty: Our Story, 1998, an interior ceramic mural by Lee Brozgold through the Board of Education's Sites for Students program.
• Bayard Rustin High School, 351 18^th Street. This school has a number of projects created by the WPA / FAP program. Projects include The Art Contribution to Civilization, 1936, a lobby mural by Jean Charlot , Spiritual Motive: Galahad, 1936 a stained glass work by Gerard Recke and Industrial Chronology in Textiles, 1935 a mural by Michael Loew which is the process of being conserved.
• High School of Graphic Communication Arts, 439 West 49 Street an exterior mosaic by Hans Hoffman, Untitled, 1958.
• Martin Luther King, Jr. High School, 122 Amsterdam Ave. Martin Luther King Memorial, 1973, an exterior weathering steel sculpture by William Tarr.
• LaGuardia High School of the Performing Arts, 100 Amsterdam Ave., LaGuardia Suite, 1997, an interior mixed media installation by Donald Lipski, who will be present to talk about his work.
• PS 166, 132 West 89^th Street, Las Menians, 1996, a series of bronze sculptures by Nobi Shioya.
• West Side High School, 140 West 102 Street, West Side High School Park, 1999, a mixed media exterior installation by Allan and Ellen Wexler.

Rockefeller Center
Tour Leader: Sandra Lang, New York University, New York, NY
Join a walking tour through Rockefeller Center's extensive art program. Consisting of 19 buildings on nearly 22 acres in the heart of New York City, Rockefeller Center is one of the largest privately owned business and entertainment complexes. From the first of the Center's buildings constructed in 1931 through refurbishments today, integrating art into the design and development of the Center continues to be part of its mission. Originally the theme of "New Frontiers" was given for the Rockefeller Center art program. More than 30 artists created over 100 artworks for the Center in a wide variety of materials including painted murals, wood or stone carvings, bronze, stainless steel, aluminum, and glass. The tour will include art in the original buildings completed between 1932 and 1940 to the east of Sixth Avenue, as well as art in later buildings on the west side of the Avenue which is still considered part of the Rockefeller Center complex.

Roosevelt Island: Public Art + Conservation
Leaders: Gregory P. Mink, City of New York Heath and Hospitals Corporation, NY, NY, and Phyllis Samitz Cohen, Municipal Art Society, New York, NY
One of NYC's lost treasures - The WPA mural Abstraction by Ilya Bolotowsky- has been rediscovered and restored through the Municipal Art Society's Adopt-A-Mural program in partnership with the Health and Hospitals Corporation and the Art Commission of the City of New York. Bolotowsky painted the mural in 1941 at the Coler- Goldwater Memorial Hospital on Roosevelt Island. His 350 square-foot wrap-around mural covers the wall of a circular windowed recreation and dining room.

Programming for this tour includes a fascinating on-site presentation of the conservation treatment given by conservator Luca Bonetti. The artist's son, Andrew Bolotowsky, will also be present. In addition, a walking tour of Roosevelt Island, and other Island public art projects will be included, along with a ride back to the "Manhattan Mainland" on the Roosevelt Island tram- a great chance to view the Queens and Manhattan skylines and the East River.

Bolotowsky's mural was one of the few abstract murals commissioned by the WPA. A member of the American Abstract Artists' group, Bolotowsky ranked among the pioneers of 1930' s nonobjective American art. For this project, he argued that a hospital mural "should contain no definite subject matter but should be generally soothing in its line and color." The mural is composed of straight lines and geometric shapes. Its color scheme emphasizes a sense of order and harmony.

Hidden since the mid-1970's under seven coats of oil and latex wall paint, conservation work by Luca Bonetti began in January 2001. Through a painstaking combination of sensitively applied small scalpels and solvents, Bonetti and his assistants managed to remove all seven layers of paint. They then consolidated cracked areas in the mural, reattached flaking paint, and impaired hundreds of small losses.

The Municipal Art Society of New York, incorporated in 1893, plays a unique role among New York's arts institutions as both a recognized cultural center and civic advocate for excellence in urban design and planning, and preservation of the best of New York's past. By integrating advocacy campaigns, exhibitions, panel discussions, walking tours, research, publications, symposia, lectures and author series, the MAS educates and informs New Yorkers about a wide range of issues shaping their city. Encompassing the broad fields of urban planning, design, architecture and historic preservation, the MAS addresses such issues as infrastructure, open space, public art, community renewal, as well as specific initiatives driving land-use, development and public investment.

BRONX TOURS

Lehman College and Hall of Fame for Great Americans 
Tour Leader: Susan Hoetzel, Lehman College Art Gallery, Bronx, NY
The Lehman College visit will include a campus public art tour featuring works by Jackie Ferrara, Ron Baron, Howardina Pindell, and Christopher Janney. It will also include a trip to the Lehman College Art Gallery, housed in a building designed by Marcel Breuer, which is currently showing Edith De Chiara: Informed by Nature and Edwine Seymour: Island Possessed/Vodou Rituals in Haiti. Lehman College is part of the City University of New York.

After viewing the works at Lehman, a short subway ride will bring you to the fascinating Hall Of Fame For Great Americans on the campus of Bronx Community College. Ralph M. Rourke, Director of the Hall Of Fame, will lead a tour of this newly conserved site. Celebrating its 100 Year Anniversary, the building was designed by the renowned architect Stanford White, and is placed on the National Register of Historic Places. It was once the uptown campus of New York University. The Hall of Fame contains "the DNA of our nation' s roots" in 102 bronze busts created by 55 sculptors. Artists include Daniel Chester French, the sculptor of Washington DC' s Lincoln Memorial. Portraits in the Hall of Fame include Booker T. Washington, Edgar Allan Poe, Harriet Beecher Stowe, James Fenimore Cooper, Walt Whitman, James Whistler, and Jane Addams.

QUEENS TOURS

Long Island City: Sculptural Spaces
Tour Leaders: Alyson Baker, Socrates Sculpture Park, Astoria, NYand Amy Hau, Isamu Noguchi Museum, Astoria, NY
The tours will address the historical development of the organizations with special focus on the evolution of these industrial spaces into unique spaces for viewing sculpture and their impact on the neighborhood. Participants will also learn about the work of Noguchi and di Suvero and how their philosophies have been interpreted into the current public programs and services that are transforming the neighborhood into a cultural community.

The Isamu Noguchi Garden Museum and Socrates Sculpture Park, located on the Queens side of the East River, have called Long Island City their home for many years. Sculptors Isamu Noguchi and Mark di Suvero, the founders of these two organizations, were both attracted to the industrial setting of the area and moved their studios to Long Island City in the 60s. This excursion explores the unique public spaces that resulted from these artists' visions of sculpture in space: The garden and refurbished factory that Isamu Noguchi transformed for the exhibition of his life' s work, and the open-air park, founded by Mark di Suvero, which exhibits large-scale contemporary sculpture by emerging international artists. Although the collections and the settings of these organizations are in stark contrast with one another, it is this contrast and the proximity of the organizations to each other that engender conversations about the role of art in urban landscape and planned environments.

At Socrates Sculpture Park, exhibiting artists Tom Carruthers, Charles Goldman, Kristen Mosher and Clara Williams will speak about their work.

Crossing the Line: Temporary Projects by the Queens Museum of Art
Tour Leader: Valerie Smith, Queens Museum of Art, Corona, NY
The Queens Museum of Art has organized innovative and exciting temporary public art projects located throughout New York City' s most diverse borough. Join curator Valerie Smith on a tour of selected projects. Tour participants will take the subway with Valerie to the Queens Museum. From the museum, the tour will be conducted by van.

See projects by Nari Ward, Manuel Acevedo, Robyn Love, Paul Etienne Lincoln, Pepón Osorio, Brian Tolle, Brandon Ballengée, SLAAAP!, and Mark Dion.

TRANSIT TOURS

MTA Arts for Transit: 81 Street Station, Museum of Natural History, and Downtown Manhattan
Leader: Kendal Henry, MTA, Arts for Transit Program, New York, NY
Join Kendal Henry for a tour of MTA Highlights. Projects include:

• 81st Street/Museum of Natural History—MTA Arts for Transit Staff
• 14th Street/8th Avenue—Tom Otterness
• Canal Street/8th Avenue—Walter Martin and Paloma Munoz
• World Trade Center Complex—Kristin Jones and Andrew Ginzel
• Cortlandt Street—Margie Hughto
• Union Square Complex—Mary Miss

MTA Arts for Transit: Grand Central Terminal and Lincoln Center 
Leader: Erica Behrens, MTA Arts for Transit, New York, NY
This tour will focus on the dynamic MTA Arts for Transit projects at historic Grand Central Terminal and Lincoln Center. Projects include:

• An overview of the renovation of Grand Central Terminal/Grand Central Station, including the famous celestial ceiling.
• Jackie Ferrara—Grand Central Shuttle
• Christopher Sproat—Flushing platform
• Donald Lipski—Grand Central Market
• Ellen Driscoll—Grand Central North
• Roberto Juarez—Waiting Room/Station Master's Office
• MILK (Moments of Intimacy, Laughter, and Kindness) a photography exhibit in Grand Central Terminal's Vanderbilt Hall
• Nancy Spero—66th Street/Lincoln Center

Hudson Bergen Light Rail, New Jersey Transit
Tour Leader: Tom Moran, New Jersey State Council on the Arts, Trenton, NJ
Art is an integral part of New Jersey Transit's Hudson-Bergen Light Rail Transit System. Each station of the Hudson-Bergen line includes artwork that evokes the unique character of the surrounding community and celebrates the cultural diversity in the Hudson-Bergen Corridor.

In a collaborative effort with planners, architects, engineers and the public, over 30 artists have created more than 50 public art projects in a variety of media including tile, enamel, glass, concrete, etc. for the first 12 stations of the system, which are currently in operation. Working with common elements of transit infrastructure, such as platforms, plazas, windscreens, kiosks, canopies and signage, the artists have reinterpreted these everyday forms to create art that enhances the transit experience for residents, visitors and workers.

Conference attendees taking the public art tour of the Hudson-Bergen Light Rail (HBLRTS) will depart NYC via the PATH (Port Authority Trans-Hudson) system to Exchange Place in Jersey City, New Jersey. The tour will board the light rail at Exchange Place at approximately 2:30 PM and make its first stop at 45th Street in Bayonne where works by Katherine Hackl, Gregg LeFevre, Nina Yankowitz and Barry Holden, among others are installed. The second stop will be at Richard Street in Jersey City to view works by Alastair Noble, Karl Jensen, Tom Nussbaum and others. The third stop will be at the Liberty Science Center and works on view there include those by Arlene Slavin, Wopo Holup, Bill & Mary Buchen and others. The tour will board the western branch of the HBLRTS and travel to Martin Luther King Drive to view works by Mel Edwards, Ben Jones, Roy Crosse, Jonathan Shahn and others. The tour will return to Exchange Place for the conclusion of the tour at 4:45 PM and for the trip back to NYC via the PATH system. (Conference attendees taking the light rail tour will be provided with free tickets for the HBLRTS. A PATH system two-trip Quick Card can be purchased at the PATH station for $3.00.)