PUBLIC ART. I LOVE IT!

[DrBGood]

https://technologyparkvt.com/the-story-of-the-whales-tails/

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/drowning-girl-statue-causes-stir-bilbao-2021-09-28/

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[Masmus]

The original building at this location had a mural with this alien. It was torn down and the bank built in its place. The new art was put up showing the the alien miss judging his landing spot because of the new location of the wall. I first saw this in the early nineties.

 

[Manual Slim]

 

[mycroftxxx]

In Cardiff-By-The-Sea in San Diego’s North County, there’s a public sculpture of a surfer, officially named “Magic Carpet Ride”:

But, because no self-respecting surfer would ever be caught looking like that, it quickly got renamed by the community as the Cardiff Kook, and has been the target of local guerrilla artists ever since; here’s one of the more famous and elaborate hacks, even made the WSJ:

The city of Encinitas, of which Cardiff is a “community”, owns the statue, and for quite a while the Encinitas city council, shall we say, had a corncob inserted firmly into its lower passage regarding the indignities visited on the Kook, failing to see that this spectacularly successful community participation public art project was a bona fide tourist attraction and net benefit to the city; there were rumblings that some of the perpetrators - many of whom were reasonably well-known local artists - would be cited and fined; however, there was a backlash, and the Encinitas powers that be seem to have reached an uneasy détente with the locals; the Cardiff Kook still gets decorated on a regular basis, although maybe not with quite the élan of the heady early days. Still, a good example of public participation art.

 

[WingedWords]

In Cardiff-By-The-Sea in San Diego’s North County, there’s a public sculpture of a surfer, officially named “Magic Carpet Ride”:

But, because no self-respecting surfer would ever be caught looking like that, it quickly got renamed by the community as the Cardiff Kook, and has been the target of local guerrilla artists ever since; here’s one of the more famous and elaborate hacks, even made the WSJ:

The city of Encinitas, of which Cardiff is a “community”, owns the statue, and for quite a while the Encinitas city council, shall we say, had a corncob inserted firmly into its lower passage regarding the indignities visited on the Kook, failing to see that this spectacularly successful community participation public art project was a bona fide tourist attraction and net benefit to the city; there were rumblings that some of the perpetrators - many of whom were reasonably well-known local artists - would be cited and fined; however, there was a backlash, and the Encinitas powers that be seem to have reached an uneasy détente with the locals; the Cardiff Kook still gets decorated on a regular basis, although maybe not with quite the élan of the heady early days. Still, a good example of public participation art.

Slightly less obtrusive, a colleague of my partner has an ongoing project photographing public sculptures being photobombed by a small green teddy bear.

Green Ted: About

Green Ted (sculpture enthusuiast) background information.

greented.co.uk

Here's Green Ted with the statue of poet John Betjeman in St Pancras railway station.

And with the statue of Churchill in Parliament Square.

 

[telemnemonics]

In Cardiff-By-The-Sea in San Diego’s North County, there’s a public sculpture of a surfer, officially named “Magic Carpet Ride”:

But, because no self-respecting surfer would ever be caught looking like that, it quickly got renamed by the community as the Cardiff Kook, and has been the target of local guerrilla artists ever since; here’s one of the more famous and elaborate hacks, even made the WSJ:

The city of Encinitas, of which Cardiff is a “community”, owns the statue, and for quite a while the Encinitas city council, shall we say, had a corncob inserted firmly into its lower passage regarding the indignities visited on the Kook, failing to see that this spectacularly successful community participation public art project was a bona fide tourist attraction and net benefit to the city; there were rumblings that some of the perpetrators - many of whom were reasonably well-known local artists - would be cited and fined; however, there was a backlash, and the Encinitas powers that be seem to have reached an uneasy détente with the locals; the Cardiff Kook still gets decorated on a regular basis, although maybe not with quite the élan of the heady early days. Still, a good example of public participation art.

Interesting! Great illustration of art decisions made at the corporate or guv level.
Corporate art is similarly problematic, or a sort of trap for artists and society.
But art is supposed to do things with/ to/ for society, not just decorate.
And if society assaults art, the art is working!
Despite the artist being something of a dope.
Artists are people too, many miss the mark by miles.

 

[Kandinskyesque]

In Cardiff-By-The-Sea in San Diego’s North County, there’s a public sculpture of a surfer, officially named “Magic Carpet Ride”:

But, because no self-respecting surfer would ever be caught looking like that, it quickly got renamed by the community as the Cardiff Kook, and has been the target of local guerrilla artists ever since; here’s one of the more famous and elaborate hacks, even made the WSJ:

The city of Encinitas, of which Cardiff is a “community”, owns the statue, and for quite a while the Encinitas city council, shall we say, had a corncob inserted firmly into its lower passage regarding the indignities visited on the Kook, failing to see that this spectacularly successful community participation public art project was a bona fide tourist attraction and net benefit to the city; there were rumblings that some of the perpetrators - many of whom were reasonably well-known local artists - would be cited and fined; however, there was a backlash, and the Encinitas powers that be seem to have reached an uneasy détente with the locals; the Cardiff Kook still gets decorated on a regular basis, although maybe not with quite the élan of the heady early days. Still, a good example of public participation art.

I love this, Jaws still remains my favourite movie.
Is the shark addition still there?
Mrs K travels every three months to Carlsbad for work (not for the past 2 years due to restrictions so runs her team remotely from Scotland).
I'll be heading there with her at the latter end of this year provided my health and the global health improves.
If Jaws is still there, then I'm putting this place on my list.

 

[Kandinskyesque]

Slightly less obtrusive, a colleague of my partner has an ongoing project photographing public sculptures being photobombed by a small green teddy bear.

Green Ted: About

Green Ted (sculpture enthusuiast) background information.

greented.co.uk

Here's Green Ted with the statue of poet John Betjeman in St Pancras railway station. View attachment 943604
And with the statue of Churchill in Parliament Square.
View attachment 943607

The John Betjeman statue reminds me of this one of in Dublin Leopold Bloom from Joyce's Ulysses.
Mr Bloom seems to be looking up at the absent Nelson's Column outside the GPO building on O'Connell Street.
Nelson's Column was 'dismantled' allegedly by some friends of Dublin Corporation in 1966.

 

[Skyhook]

There are some really talented graffitti artists out there

Not much graphical talent required for the original artwork nor the response but nevertheless, this is pretty much perfect!

 

[uriah1]

This will be the largest in the USA. Already is I think

 

[maxvintage]

Washington DC has a lot of public art: Some of it is fantastic and some of it is banal. My favorite is easily overlooked: The Grant memorial, which is facing the Washington Monument in front of the capital. it's easy to overlook because it's just anither historical dude on a horse, but when you look closer it's astonishing. There are two deeply cast, highly detailed sculpture groups on either side which, amazingly, tell a completely different story depending on where you are standing.

From one side, for example, you see a heroic cavalry charge, but from the other side you see that it's all gone terribly wrong

On the other side soldiers are pulling a caisson, and it's an incredibly dynamic story--again from one view it's mundane but from the other everything has gone chaotically wrong. The guys in the back, hunkered down on a cold rainy day, don't yet realize that the lead rider may have been shot.

Figures are in thick mud and you can see discarded gear and under the caisson, a discarded letter some soldier wrote.

Grant looks on impassively, towards the Washington and Lincoln memorials, grim, hat down and collar drawn up against the cold

Below is a short movie about the 2017 restoration of the memorial. It's really remarkable and easily overlooked










View attachment 943665

 

[Kandinskyesque]

I like this topic and I agree. I only worry that cancel culture sees somehow that it has the capacity, right and historical knowledge to make determinations as to certain public art. We should always take the bad with the good, because over time, what's bad and what's good is very subject to change.

For my own little part I commissioned a local street artist to put something on the side of my house which abuts a public walkway. It's 100 yards from a school and I wanted something that reminded me of the robin that lived in my hedge that I loved so much and that would make children happy on the way to school.

View attachment 943202

I showed this photograph to Mrs K.
She's now busy looking for somebody to do something similar to our place.
It's an absolutely wonderful gift to your neighbourhood.

 

[buster poser]

Here in New Mexico, public art is pretty much everywhere. I'd need my own thread. This is cool, down in Burque.

Loved my time working in DC, my morning/lunch run routes took me by some great spots. Loved the giant ("The Awakening") down on Hains Point...

...but I gather it's been moved to that hellhole at National Harbor. Another overlooked memorial I really like is tough to find. Not my pic or kid, but it's nice for scale. Part of a larger FDR memorial that has a number of great sculptures:

Another unappreciated gem is dedicated to the other Roosevelt, on the tiny island that bears his name.

 

[StrangerNY]

I love street art. I try to get photos of it from everywhere I go. Some examples:

Giant steel origami, NYC

Chinatown, NYC

Coney Island Aquarium

Brooklyn

Vienna

Amsterdam

Philadelphia

Montreal

- D

 

[RollingBender]

In a little town of 450 people, many miles from nowhere, you can find not only one but 2 sculptures by artist John Lopez. The town is Faith, SD (famous for the discovery of the T-Rex, “Sue”). I’ve been going there annually on a hunting vacation.

Here’s Lopez’s “Sue” sculpture.

One of the mediums Lopez works with is junk. If you look closely, you will see that the sculpture is made out of bits and pieces of what you will find rusting away behind the shed of most working farms and ranches.

The other Lopez sculpture in Faith is this life size cowboy

I love his necktie made from a large wood rasp.

Rapid City has a bunch of his bronze work around town.

John Lopez Studio

"The anatomy and kinetics intermixed with curious choices of familiar steel objects speckled about the sculpture in randomly organized patterns..."

www.johnlopezstudio.com

 

[DrBGood]

View attachment 943695
C-P3O ancestor ? LOL.

The greatest of them all. The whole city of Barcelona actually.

 

[DrBGood]

Recto-verso in Rocastrada Italy.

 

[DrBGood]

 

[rcole_sooner]

 

[rcole_sooner]