In big cities you can easily be overcome by the amount of grey and shades of grey you come across. Sidewalks, streets, steel supports, buildings, manhole covers, sewer grates, the sky, etc... And other than 50 shades of grey, the color does not translate into happy, bright, and cheery feelings! Blah, sadness, depression...But don't you worry because like the song says "Grey skies are going to clear up! Put on a happy face!"
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There are people who are effected by their environment and then there are people who effect their environment. In order to conquer the grey in big cities you have to go out and add a little color to the urban palette! These efforts can range from the large art installations in public areas (think the Bean in Chicago) to the smallest little effort by 1 man or woman with some spray paint. Since cities have more to worry about than sprucing up an old rock or planting a couple of perennials, not enough gets done...and nothing ever gets done where it needs to get done.
Affluent gentrified neighborhoods like Tremont get the benefit of public art projects because their citizens demand such things. Tremont is filled with art galleries, artists, and people who can make things happen. We get to benefit from things like Dendrite (the statue outside our house) or a pocket park by the new highway bridges (with IMO the best views of the city) because they are written into larger government funded projects. It's not because the city cares more about our neighborhood or less about others. It's because our neighborhood cares more about our neighborhood. We have a base to build upon. We used a ground up approach and now is the time when we can start putting the garnishment and decorations on our stable, proven, and time tested neighborhood. |
Some neighborhoods aren't there yet but that doesn't mean that they should be punished by having to look at the grey urban landscape day in and day out. Actually these areas are the blank canvases that need color and art most of all. Art is not only a litmus test for urban success but it's also an economic driver. The Beachland Ballroom for example is a music hall that not only keeps the Waterloo Road sidewalks filled with visitors, it's the heart of the whole North Collinwood neighborhood! Show nights bring in fans for more than just the show. They get dinner, drinks, and put feet on the ground. The Capitol Theatre renovation in Gordon Square was a catalyst to the rejuvenation of that whole area. The Near West Theatre's new home is helping to push Gordon Square's success east down Detroit towards Hingetown which got a kick start from the Transformer Station art space that opened there in 2011. The Tremont Art Walk keeps people coming to the Tremont area art galleries and restaurants every 2nd Friday of the month.
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So what can you and your neighborhood do? Well, that's the best thing about art. Some of the best pieces cost little to put together. Take for instance Beaufort, SC. All they did was paint flowers around manhole covers and are now looking to expand that because of its popularity. Simple, cheap, easy...but also colorful and interesting. It reminds me of the Captain America-like manhole cover that I found in Tremont. All you need is a little imagination (and a lookout) and boom! You now have some art to breakup the grey canvas that surrounds you.
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In Chicago, Gina and I came across an old mail box that had been equipped with flower boxes and flowers. It's so easy and simple but so creative an necessary at the same time. It looked so nice that the Post Office just left it there and put the updated blue box right next to it. In most cases, people (no matter how stuffy or regulated) will let these kinda things go because they are, even in the littlest way, important to neighborhoods and to cities. Plus it's not worth the time, effort, and potential backlash to remove it. Art gets a +1 over the federal government on this one.
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Art just isn't there to look at either. Some of the most popular pieces are interactive. It makes people stop what they're doing and go get a picture or spin a wheel or walk up something. Great interactive art plays with your human need to participate but not enough to be complicated. Take for instance the painting outside of Grumpy's below on the left. Flowers with the centers cut out. No instructions. Not a whole lot of money invested in it. You feel however the need to pop your heads in and snap a picture. It works on a lot of levels but it makes you want to interact with it and it makes you happy. The picture from Navy Pier on the right is a little more elaborate but I'm guessing that Gina isn't the first person (although she is the best looking) to pose in this way with it. She's smiling and we laughed about it later while looking at pictures. Being able to interact with your environment leaves you with a lasting connection to that place and time. Have you ever felt that way walking past a fast food parking lot?
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With that all being said... I think tagging your misspelled name in a goofy font on a exterior wall or sign is pointless and stupid. Yes, it's still art but I'm allowed to have my opinion and my opinion is that it's lazy and worthless. Fortunately its saving grace is that it represents the other side of public art...having balls. There are museums filled with beautiful pieces of art and parks filled with even more. You sign up, submit ideas and concepts, get chosen, work for months, and have it installed. Bravo! Honestly, that takes way too long and there's a good possibility that most of us will never have this happen. Now avoiding that whole getting chosen and being approved process thing and going right out to create takes balls. And when you're done, for nothing to happen to it because it's that damn good...that's respect right there! Sometimes you just have to create and be seen! It's a feeling that can't be micromanaged.
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Don't get me wrong, Government funded art is all well and good but the most intriguing and infamous art sometimes comes from a talented person with little money to work with and a desire to be noticed. There's so much blank canvas out there in Cleveland that needs to be targeted but it doesn't seem like there are a lot of artists out there that want to take advantage of it. Maybe that shows how we perceive government's support of public art? We're scared to get caught because we don't see it as art. We see it as a crime.
Maybe it's about time we start to publicly express ourselves artistically past that line of good decency urban pioneers?...
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