2003 in review: public art

Art in America, August, 2004

1 Takashi Murakami

Reversed Double Helix. Two balloons, 30 feet in diameter, a 30-foot-tall Buddha-like figure, four smaller figures and mushroom-shaped seating, temporarily installed at Rockefeller Center, a Public Art Fund project.

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2 Valerie Otani

Voices of Remembrance. Traditional Japanese gates with metal ID tags, a reference to the site's history as a Japanese-American detention center in 1942, at the Expo Center Station in Portland, commissioned by the Tri-County Metropolitan District of Oregon.

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3 Vito Acconci

Roof Like a Liquid Flung Over the Plaza. A stainless-steel structure with fluorescent lights, providing shelter and seating at the Cannon Center for the Performing Arts in Memphis, a city commission.

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4 Ann Gardner

Ring of Water. Hundreds of glass mosaic raindrops suspended on 22-foot-long cables above a terrazzo floor, commissioned by the Atlanta Bureau of Cultural Affairs for the city's new courthouse.

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5 Heimick & Schechter

Exquisite Corpse. A 26-foot-long row of glass panels, in aluminum frames, depicting oversize cross sections of a human body, at the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension in St. Paul, Minn., a state commission.

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6 Gerard Stripling

Repose. Five curved bronze sculptures for seating at Treasure Island Park in Laguna Beach, Calif., a city commission.

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7 Albert Paley

The Sentinel. A 73-foot-tall stainless-steel, bronze and Cor-Ten sculpture at the Rochester Institute of Technology.

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8 Sol LeWitt

A 400-foot-long wall drawing in the lobby of the Children's Hospital of New York-Presbyterian, a private commission.

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9 Wim Delvoye

Gothic. A Cor-Ten backhoe, part of two temporary "construction sites" at Doris C. Freedman Plaza and Madison Square Park in New York, a joint commission of the park and the Public Art Fund.

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10 R.M. Fischer

Union Square Colonnade. Four lampposts, ranging in height from 18 to 24 feet, made from reused aluminum parts and new stainless-steel elements on 13-foot-tall granite bases, a project of the San Francisco Arts Commission.

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11 Ming Fay

Ginkgoberry Gwa. Suspended glass flowers and two bronze floor sculptures, at the convention center expansion in Portland, Ore., a project of the Regional Arts & Culture Council.

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12 Magdalena Abakanowicz

Open-Air Aquarium. Thirty stainless-steel fish on poles, averaging 17 feet in height, at Penn's Landing, for the Redevelopment Authority in Philadelphia.

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13 Jaume Plensa

Talking Continent. Six 6-foot-fiberglass figures with internal lights that change color, atop 30-foot-tall poles, at the Sports and Entertainment Plaza in Jacksonville, Fla., a city commission.

14 Ron Baron

O's. Two 16-foot-tall sculptures made of 7,000 plastic trophy figures at the University of Oregon's Autzen Stadium, a state Percent for Art commission.

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15 Tony Berlant

What You See Is Who You Are. A 10-by-60-foot collaged landscape of tin on wood at the Target Corporation headquarters in Minneapolis.

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16 Jeremy Blake

Cowboy Waltz. A one-minute video of morphing abstract forms, played hourly in Times Square, a Creative Time project.

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17 Ed Levine

Embodying Thoreau: Dwelling, Sitting, Watching. Three wooden structures inspired by the author, at the Pennypack Environmental Center in Philadelphia, commissioned by the Fairmount Park Art Association.

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18 Jonathan Borofsky

Dancers. Two 60-foot-tall steel and fiberglass figures, at the Performing Arts Sculpture Park in Denver, a city commission.

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19 Mike Glier

Town Green. Wall paintings at the City Hall Annex in Cambridge, Mass., a city commission.

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20 Robert Arneson

Yin and Yang. Two 6-foot bronze heads with acrylic coating, on the Embarcadero, a project of the San Francisco Arts Commissioner.

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21 Elizabeth Conner

Nest Set for Police and Fire. Two 13-foot-tall rusted steel sculptures in the shape of hornets' nests, at the Police and Fire Training Academy in Charlotte, N.C., a city commission.

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22 Mark Handforth

Lamppost. An altered but functional industrial streetlamp, temporarily sited at Doris C. Freedman Plaza near New York's Central Park, a Public Art Fund project.

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23 Brad Goldberg

Water Sculptures with Serpentine Benches. Two granite fountains with sidewalk seating, commissioned by the Cultural Arts Council of Houston and Harris County.

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