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  • From: "Steve Wright" <swright AT townofchapelhill.org>
  • To: <chpac-staff AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [Chpac-staff] CHPAC In News : 9-12-07
  • Date: Wed, 12 Sep 2007 10:43:03 -0400

Hello CHPAC,

 

Linked and pasted below is an article from today about the TOC artwork.  I look forward to seeing you all at the new Public Works building this evening at 5pm; if you have any questions please call.

 

-Steve

968-2749

 

 

Chapel Hill Herald Opinion Column

- Is money for public art funds well-spent?

The new Chapel Hill Town Operations Center is a piece of work. It is, in fact, the biggest piece of work in the history of town government, the largest municipal project ever undertaken.

For $52 million, the town now has a new place for its public works department, a new transit center, offices, a kitchen and dining room, new space for equipment and ... oh, yes, some public art.

http://www.heraldsun.com/opinion/chhedits/57-880215.cfm

 

 

 

Is money for public art funds well-spent?

 

September 12, 2007   12:06 am

The new Chapel Hill Town Operations Center is a piece of work. It is, in fact, the biggest piece of work in the history of town government, the largest municipal project ever undertaken.

 

For $52 million, the town now has a new place for its public works department, a new transit center, offices, a kitchen and dining room, new space for equipment and ... oh, yes, some public art.

 

There are a lot of interesting features at the Town Ops Center -- a water quality pond, shallow bio-retention pools, permeable pavement and more. But it's the art that has garnered our attention.

 

The amount of money spent on that public art, the location of that public art and the need for that public art has been a controversial issue for some time. Because of the Town of Chapel Hill's Percent for Arts Ordinance, $420,000 was set aside for public art at the Town Ops Center. That money was spent on an engraved, 40-foot-long marble bench and a semicircular stone wall on which are mounted a bronzed selection of hand tools.

 

Chapel Hill is by no means the only community with a percent-for-art ordinance; the movement has been growing, and the concept exists everywhere from New York City to Louisiana to Oregon. In most progressive communities, like this one, there is the understanding that putting aside money for public art has real civic benefits and enriches all of us.

 

The question concerning the Town Ops Center, though, is not whether the concept is right but whether this was the right place to spend so much money.

 

Inherent in the concept is that public art should be ... well, public. The Ops Center is home to several hundred public works employees, but it is by no means public. Stuck out on Millhouse Road, in the middle of what had been farmland, it's unlikely to be seen by many residents of this community. That's the reason -- not the art itself, not the concept of public art -- why some have questioned the expenditure of so much money.

 

It's a legitimate question and a justifiable concern. Perhaps, somewhere along the line, more attention should have been paid to whether we needed to spend all of that 1 percent at this particular site. But it's important as well not to throw out the baby with the bathwater, and deny the real benefits of public art.

 

URL for this article: http://www.heraldsun.com/opinion/chhedits/57-880215.cfm

 



  • [Chpac-staff] CHPAC In News : 9-12-07, Steve Wright, 09/12/2007

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