Public Art Ideas Competition 2013

Transcription

1 Connect Historic Boston Public Art Ideas Competition 2013 Regional New England Opportunity CALL TO STUDENT ARTISTS + DESIGNERS Overview This is a student competition for Public Art proposals that engage and activate the street networks, transportation modes and links to National Park Service sites throughout downtown Boston. Three proposals will be selected to receive a financial award of $500 each by a jury of artists, public art administrators and transportation experts. An exhibit of all proposals will take place late spring/early summer at BSA Space, home to the Boston Society of Architects at 290 Congress Street in Boston. Deadline: 5PM Friday, April 5, 2013

2 What is Connect Historic Boston? Connect Historic Boston is an initiative between the National Park Service (NPS) and the City of Boston s Transportation Department to make walking, biking, and taking the T to National Park Service sites and other destinations in downtown Boston easy and fun. Our initiative proposes upgrades to the built environment along the streets, sidewalks, and bridges that link transit stations to park destinations; and explores new tools for wayfinding including digital applications, traditional maps, and navigational markers in the landscape such as architecture, art, sound and signage. We are building a coalition of partners that include historic sites, advocates for walking and biking, neighborhood associations, and government agencies that will help promote the Connect Historic Boston initiative as the way to get around downtown Boston. The scope of our project includes most of downtown Boston including Faneuil Hall, the Boston Harbor Islands Pavilion on the Rose Kennedy Greenway and The Abiel Smith School on Joy Street along the Black Heritage Trail in Beacon Hill. We are also including The Charlestown Navy Yard. Key transit includes the T (specifically the North Station, Haymarket, State Street and Aquarium stations), bus connections at Haymarket, the ferry to Charlestown from Long Wharf, and bikeshare facilities. (see attached map) The Call We are expanding our outreach with a Public Art Ideas competition. We want to see YOUR ideas of how best to celebrate this initiative. How would you call attention to public transportation and historical sites? How do you engage and activate the streets, infrastructure, stations, waterways, sites and even transportation itself, enhancing the experience of moving through the city? What are the opportunities to create a memorable event or intervention that celebrates city life? Is it performative, ephemeral, temporal or virtual? Can you imagine a Hubway (bikeshare) ballet? A light, sound or video installation? A ferry parade? The scope is broad and far-reaching, but whatever you conjure up it MUST relate to transportation, movement and place. Eligibility We welcome submissions by New England (ME, MA, NH, VT, RI and CT) University and College Students (graduate and undergraduate) from all fields, particularly the visual and performing arts, landscape architecture, design and engineering. Interdisciplinary teams are highly encouraged. Only one entry per individual/team. Submission - One submission form per individual entrant/team (see attached) - A 500 word max description of the project, its relationship to the initiative, the proposed site or platform and imagined execution (seasonality, duration, hour of the day, participants, etc.) - A 24 x 36 sized board depicting the ideation, process and product. Boards must be saved to a.pdf not to exceed 8MB in total file size and submitted electronically. Submissions must be ed to: addy.smith-reiman@cityofboston.gov Deadline: 5PM Friday, April 5, 2013

3 Criteria Your work will be judged by a stellar group of diverse professionals who have measurable success in the fields of art and transportation. They will be looking for fantastic and fantastical ideas that bind well with the vision of Connect Historic Boston and break away from traditional modes of place-making and event production. The submission must be well crafted, thoughtful, fun and inspiring. Awards Cash awards of $500 will be awarded to the top three proposals. All work will be exhibited late spring at BSA Space, home to the Boston Society of Architects at 290 Congress Street in Boston. Competition Timeline February 1 st - Competition opens February 16 th Project Info session* (optional) March 2 nd Project Info session* (optional) April 5th - DEADLINE 5 p.m. April - review panel meets May Award announcement June exhibit at BSA Space *Project Info Session Two info sessions will be held on Saturday afternoons beginning at 1PM: February 16 th and March 2 nd, at BSA Space, 290 Congress Street in Boston. We will cover site history, provide maps and materials, and head out on walking tours of the project area, including the T. These sessions are optional. Maps and supporting materials will also be made available starting February 1 st at Partner organizations for this competition We are working in partnership with the Boston Transportation Department, The National Park Service, The New England Foundation for the Arts, The Community Design Resource Center, The Boston Society of Architects, The Livable Streets Alliance, Boston Bikes and the Boston Arts Commission. The steering committee includes Gretchen Schneider, Executive Director of the Community Design Resource Center, Carolina Aragon, Adjunct Professor of Landscape Architecture at UMASS Amherst, Elysian McNiff, Program Coordinator for Public Art at NEFA and Addy Smith-Reiman, Project Manager for Connect Historic Boston. Jury Jackie Douglas is the Executive Director of LivableStreets, an organization promoting safe, convenient, and affordable transportation for all people in the Boston region to make our communities more connected and livable. LivableStreets challenges people to think differently and to demand a system that balances transit, walking and biking with automobiles. Her work currently focuses on rethinking bridge designs, street design to better accommodate public transit, and bicycle networks. In 2011, Jackie was awarded Advocate of the Year by the National Alliance for Biking & Walking.

4 Jennifer McGregor is a public art expert with substantive experience directing, implementing, and managing contemporary art projects and programs. She has directed Wave Hill s visual arts program since 1999, curating numerous topical exhibitions that connect the public with nature, culture and site, at this 28-acre public garden and cultural center in the Bronx. In this capacity she works with emerging and mid-career artists on temporary commissioned projects. Many of these artists have or will embark on public art projects. As the first director of New York City s Percent for Art Program from , she implemented the program guidelines and supervised the first sixty projects. In 1990, she founded McGregor Consulting to work nationally on commissions, exhibitions, and master plans. She was instrumental in starting the Public Art Network and together with Renee Piechocki was the first facilitator of the program. Most recently she and Ms. Piechocki advised the Rose Kennedy Greenway Conservancy on their public art plan. Ms. McGregor has taught at Cooper Union and New York University and regularly serves on juries and panels. She graduated from Brown University with a B.A. in art. Jim Lasko is a founder and co-artistic director of Redmoon Theater in Chicago, a civically engaged theater company. Redmoon transforms the urban landscape through ephemeral events that disrupt everyday life and provide opportunities for public engagement and community building. Past projects include an opening event for Millennium Park; Sink, Sank, Sunk, a site-specific performance that drew over 10,000 people; and the annual All Hallow s Eve Ritual. Dr. Maury Martin has been a family doctor in an independent practice in Somerville for thirty five years and has played saxophone with the Second Line Social Aid and Pleasure Society, a New Orleans style street band, since its inception a decade ago. He is also a co-founder of the HONK! festival of activist street bands in Davis Square on Columbus Day weekend, where funds for this all volunteer festival are from individuals, the small businesses of Davis Square, the Somerville Arts Council, and grants. The theme of the parade is "Reclaim the Streets for Bikes, Horns, and Feet". A brief article on this festival can be found in the Winter 2012 issue of ArchitectureBoston. Charles Tracy is a National Park Service landscape architect involved with organizing regional and community-based conservation and recreation initiatives in New England and New York. He is interested in the interplay between art and environment, specifically, public art as a catalyst for civic engagement in community environmental projects. His work currently focuses on the connection between public art and environmental stewardship and includes a series of artist-led environmental projects in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts and the New England Foundation for the Arts.

5

6 The Streets The T

7 The locks, one of the Charles River Crossings The ferry

8 The Hubway The sites (pictured here are Faneuil Hall and the Boston Harbor Islands pavilion)

9 Connect Historic Boston Public Art Ideas Competition 2013 Competition Entry Form Only one entry per entrant/team Project Title: Submitted by (list all names if submitting as a team): Institution (s): Contact for the project: Phone: Submission: Electronic entries must include: [ ] Entry Form [ ] A 500 word max description of the project, its relationship to the initiative, the proposed site or platform and imagined execution (seasonality, duration, hour of the day, participants, etc.) [ ] A 24 x 36 sized board depicting the ideation, process and product. Boards must be saved to a.pdf not to exceed 8MB. Read and check below [ ] I grant the Connect Historic Boston non-exclusive license to use this work in connection with the initiative via any form (in web, in print, etc.) Submit to: addy.smith-reiman@cityofboston.gov For more information please visit: or call Addy Smith-Reiman at or addy.smith-reiman@cityofboston.gov