Public Art Fund

Last updated

Public Art Fund is an independent, non-profit arts organization founded in 1977 by Doris C. Freedman. The organization presents contemporary art in New York City's public spaces through a series of highly visible artists' projects, new commissions, installations, and exhibitions that are emblematic of the organization's mission and innovative history.

Contents

History

Public Art Fund was founded in 1977 by Doris C. Freedman who served as the first Director of New York City's Department of Cultural Affairs, the President of the Municipal Art Society, and a tireless supporter of New York City's Percent for Art legislation. [1] Public Art Fund was born from the merger of two preexisting organizations, CityWalls, which was founded in 1966, and the Public Arts Council, founded in 197). Working with artists and museums, Public Art Fund works to bring artwork outside of traditional spaces and into the public sphere. Since its inception, Public Art Fund has presented more than 500 artists' exhibitions and projects at sites throughout New York City's five boroughs as varied as streets, plazas, parks, buses, billboards, and even major landmarks including Times Square, Rockefeller Center, the Brooklyn Bridge Park, Columbus Circle, and Lincoln Center. Susan K. Freedman has served as president since 1986. Nicholas Baume joined Public Art Fund as Director and Chief Curator in 2009, and Elizabeth Fearon Pepperman was elected chair of the Board of Directors in 2020. [2] [3]

Public Programs

In addition to presenting works of art, Public Art Fund also hosts additional programs including Public Art Fund Talks. This series encompasses discussions and presentations from today's most influential artist. Another program, In the Public Realm, is an open call which allows emerging artist to conceive and develop innovative ideas for public works. Public Art Fund also releases a semi annual magazine and exhibition catalog which provides its audience with a summary of the organizations activities and achievements. [4]

Highlighted Public Projects in New York City

Public Art Fund has collaborated with many New York City institutions, including the Whitney Museum of American Art for the Whitney Biennial, Outdoors in Central Park(2002, [5] 2004), [6] and the Museum of Modern Art for Francis AlÿsThe Modern Procession (2002). [7]

Early exhibition highlights include Agnes DenesWheatfields for Manhattan (1982), David HammonsHigher Goals (1986), and Messages to the Public (1982–1990), a series of projects created for Times Square's Spectacolor board that featured work by over 70 artists including Jenny Holzer, Keith Haring, Barbara Kruger, Vito Acconci, Lynne Tillman, Alfredo Jaar, Richard Prince, and the Guerilla Girls.

In the late 1980s and into the 1990s, the organization commissioned socially conscious pieces such as Felix Gonzalez-Torres“Untitled” billboard (1989), Gran Fury's “Women don't get AIDS…they just die from it” poster (1991), Guerilla Girls’ billboard project for Public Art Fund's PSA: Public Service Art exhibition series (1991), and Barbara Kruger's Bus (1997).

In 1997, Public Art Fund organized Ilya Kabakov's Monument to the Lost Glove, a giant glove made of red plastic resin, which was bolted to the traffic triangle where Fifth Avenue and Broadway cross at 23rd Street, and worked with him again in 2000 with The Palace of Projects, which was shown at the 69th Regiment Armory. [8]

Other New York City projects included Nancy Rubins' Big Pleasure Point (2006) at Lincoln Center; Corner Plot (2006) by Sarah Sze at the Doris C. Freedman Plaza; Alexander Calder in New York at the City Hall Park (2006) ; and Material World (2005) at the MetroTech Commons on Downtown Brooklyn, which featured new commissions by Rachel Foullon, Corin Hewitt, Matthew Day Jackson, Peter Kreider, and Mamiko Otsubo. [8]

Public Art Fund moved into a new territory when it announced it would present 2001 Turner Prize winner Martin Creed's performance art piece, Variety Show, on March 30, 2007 at the Abrons Arts Center on the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

Recent exhibition highlights include Olafur Eliasson's The New York City Waterfalls (2008), which created man-made waterfalls at four sites on New York City's waterfront; Rob Pruitt's The Andy Monument, a tribute to Andy Warhol at Union Square (2011), [9] Tatzu Nishi's Discovering Columbus (2012), which reimagined the 13-foot-tall statue of Columbus standing in a fully furnished, modern living room; [10] and Jeppe Hein's Please Touch the Art (2015) at Brooklyn Bridge Park. [11]

In In 2017, Public Art Fund is celebrating its 40th anniversary with the citywide group exhibition Commercial Break, Liz Glynn's Open House at Doris C. Freedman Plaza, Anish Kapoor's Descensionat Brooklyn Bridge Park, and Ai Weiwei's Good Fences Make Good Neighbors. [12]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William Pope.L</span> American visual artist (born 1955)

Pope.L is an American visual artist best known for his work in performance art, and interventionist public art. However, he has also produced art in painting, photography and theater. He was included in the 2002 Whitney Biennial and is a Guggenheim Fellow and a recipient of the Creative Capital Visual Arts Award. Pope.L was also included in the 2017 Whitney Biennial.

Alison Saar is a Los Angeles, California based sculptor, mixed-media, and installation artist. Her artwork focuses on the African diaspora and black female identity and is influenced by African, Caribbean, and Latin American folk art and spirituality. Saar is well known for "transforming found objects to reflect themes of cultural and social identity, history, and religion."

Doris Chanin Freedman (1928–1981) was a pioneer in the field of public art, active in New York City. She was the daughter of architect Irwin Salmon Chanin and his wife Sylvia Schofler.

Chakaia Booker is an American sculptor known for creating monumental, abstract works for both the gallery and outdoor public spaces. Booker’s works are contained in more than 40 public collections and have been exhibited across the United States, Europe, Africa, and Asia. Booker was included in the 2000 Whitney Biennial, received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2005, and an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award for Art in 2001. Booker has lived and worked in New York City’s East Village since the early 1980s and maintains a production studio in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Asian American Arts Centre</span>

The Asian American Arts Centre (AAAC) is a non-profit organization located in Chinatown in New York City. Founded in 1974, it is one of the earliest Asian American community organizations in the United States. The Arts Centre presents the ongoing developments between contemporary Asian & Asian American art forms and Western art forms through the presentation of performance, exhibitions, and public education. AAAC's permanent collection, which it has accumulated since 1989, contains hundreds of contemporary Asian American art works and traditional/folk art pieces. The organization also has an Artists Archive which documents, preserves, and promotes the presence of Asian American visual culture in the United States since 1945. This includes the East Coast, especially the greater New York area; the West Coast; and some artists in Canada, Hawaii, and overseas. The artists include Asian Americans producing art, Asian artists who are active in the United States, and other Americans who are significantly influenced by Asia. Pan-Asian in outlook, the Arts Centre's understanding of ‘Asia’ encompasses traditions and influences with sources ranging from Afghanistan to Hawaii.

Ming Fay is a Shanghai-born and New York City-based sculptor and professor. His work focuses on the concept of the garden as a symbol of utopia and the relationship between man and nature. Drawing upon an extensive knowledge of plants both Eastern and Western, real and mythical, Fay creates his own calligraphic floating forest of reeds, branches and surreal species. He is most well known for his sculpture and large scale installations and he currently teaches sculpture at William Paterson University in Wayne, New Jersey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Judith Shea</span> American sculptor and artist (born 1948)

Judith Shea is an American sculptor and artist, born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1948. She received a degree in fashion design at Parsons School of Design in 1969 and a BFA in 1975. This dual education formed the basis for her figure based works. Her career has three distinct phases: The use of cloth and clothing forms from 1974 to 1981; Hollow cast metal clothing-figure forms from 1982 until 1991; and carved full-figure statues made of wood, cloth, clay, foam and hair beginning in 1990 to present.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">West Harlem Art Fund</span>

The West Harlem Art Fund, Inc. is a public art and media organization based in the City of New York, founded in 1998. Savona Bailey-McClain is its Executive Director and Chief Curator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ezio Martinelli</span> American painter

Ezio Martinelli was an American artist who belonged to the New York School Abstract Expressionist artists, a leading art movement of the post-World War II era.

Susan K. Freedman is a leading supporter of contemporary public art in New York City. Since 1986, she has been the President of the Public Art Fund, which was founded by her mother Doris Chanin Freedman in 1977.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Donald Lipski</span> American sculptor (born 1947)

Donald Lipski is an American sculptor best known for his installation work and large-scale public works.

Liz Larner is an American installation artist and sculptor living and working in Los Angeles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Miss</span> American environmental artist (born 1944)

Mary Miss is an American artist and designer. Her work has crossed boundaries between architecture, landscape architecture, engineering and urban design. Her installations are collaborative in nature: she has worked with scientists, historians, designers, and public administrators. She is primarily interested in how to engage the public in decoding their surrounding environment.

Sarah Michelson is a British choreographer and dancer who lives and works in New York City, New York. Her work is characterized by demanding physicality and repetition, rigorous formal structures, and inventive lighting and sound design. She was one of two choreographers whose work was included in the 2012 Whitney Biennial, the first time dance was presented as part of the bi-annual exhibition. Her work has also been staged at The Walker Art Center, Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, The Kitchen, and the White Oak Dance Project. She received New York Dance and Performance awards for Group Experience (2002), Shadowmann Parts One and Two (2003), and Dogs (2008). She has served as associate director of The Center for Movement Research and associate curator of dance at The Kitchen. Currently choreographer in residence at Bard's Fisher Center, she is the recipient of their four-year fellowship to develop a commissioned work with Bard students and professional dancers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elyn Zimmerman</span> American sculptor

Elyn Zimmerman is an American sculptor known for her emphasis on large scale, site specific projects and environmental art. Along with these works, Zimmerman has exhibited drawings and photographs since graduating with an MFA in painting and photography at University of California, Los Angeles in 1972. Her teachers included Robert Heineken, Robert Irwin, and Richard Diebenkorn.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Janet Henry</span> American artist

Janet Henry is a visual artist based in New York City.

Jane ("Jenny") Hoadley Dixon is an American arts administrator. Dixon has undertaken initiatives which contributed to the development of four New York City cultural organizations—the Public Art Fund, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, Bronx Museum of the Arts, and Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum. Her work has also focused on individual artists as vital contributors to society. Dixon is currently Director Emerita of the Noguchi Museum and Trustee Emerita of the Public Art Fund.

Christopher Y. Lew is an American art curator and writer based in New York City. Lew is currently the Nancy and Fred Poses Curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rachel Owens</span> Artist (b. 1972)

Rachel Owens is an American artist. She is best known for her multi-media sculptures and installations, which often incorporate a social component. Many of her works are made from crushed glass. She lives and works in New York, NY, and is an assistant professor of art and design at Purchase College, SUNY.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arlene Slavin</span> American artist (born 1942)

Arlene Slavin is a painter, sculptor, and a print-maker whose practice also includes large-scale public art commissions. Slavin is a 1977 National Endowment for the Arts Grant recipient.

References

  1. "Percent for Art – NYC Department of Cultural Affairs". www.nyc.gov. Retrieved 2017-04-17.
  2. Grundy, Gordy (2020-09-20). "NYC Public Art Fund Elects Elizabeth Fearon Pepperman as New Chair of the Board of Directors". www.artreporttoday.com. Retrieved 2023-06-16.
  3. "Board & Staff". Public Art Fund. Retrieved 2023-06-16.
  4. "Public Art Fund – NYC-ARTS". NYC-ARTS. Retrieved 2018-10-17.
  5. "Whitney Biennial in Central Park Organized by the Public Art Fund". Whitney.
  6. "Whitney Biennials". Public Art Fund.
  7. "Projects 76: Francis Alÿs | MoMA". Museum of Modern Art.
  8. 1 2 "Guide to the Public Art Fund Archive 1966–2009 MSS 270". dlib.nyu.edu. Retrieved 2018-10-17.
  9. "Rob Pruitt unveils his Monument to Andy Warhol at Union Square West – artnet Magazine". www.artnet.com. Retrieved 2017-04-17.
  10. Lasky, Julie (2012-09-19). "A Living Room Suspended Over Columbus Circle". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2017-04-17.
  11. Pogrebin, Robin (2015-03-26). "Brooklyn Bridge Park to Display Danish Artist". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2017-04-17.
  12. Barone, Joshua (2017-03-26). "Ai Weiwei's Latest Artwork: Building Fences Throughout New York City". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2017-04-17.

Further reading