Thaumatropia

Public Art isn’t hidden away. It doesn’t live in someone’s home, or in a gallery. It’s there for everyone.

That means that everyone who engages with the art has to share.  Your individual interpretation and parsing of the work isn’t the only one that’s important, even for your own sake. Your needs and your agenda are brought into contention with those of potentially thousands (or millions) of others. And there isn’t necessarily a duty or an understanding to reach consensus about a piece. Many different evaluations develop, most are not reconciled, and it all becomes part of the piece.

At the same time, we have the conflict between audience and authority. The authority of the artist, the authority of a corporate sponsor, the authority of a government body. Each has their own needs and their own agenda- but with the added muscle of authority to press it. With the power they wield- be it authorship, or money, or Eminent Domain- the conflict between audience and authority becomes protracted. Numbers versus money. Bureaucracy versus constituency. Intended verses intention.

Public Art is the manifestation of an entrenched struggle for rights of cultural authorship.