History in Our Everyday Lives

Public Art

Public art is generally defined as various forms of art (both two-dimensional and three-dimensional) that is free and accessible to everyone.⁶⁷ Public art can include, but is not limited to, memorials, monuments, murals, sculpture, integrated architectural or landscape architectural work, community art, digital media, and performance art.⁶⁸ Many forms of public art are site-specific, meaning they have a direct and meaningful tie with the location or community in which they are placed, potentially heightening awareness in the viewers of the site and its surroundings.⁶⁹ Not only can a public art recreate a landscape, but it often serves as a major part of the larger public landscape in that its accessibility encourages interaction to its interpretation of past events.⁷⁰Public art can also be described as an interactive process involving artists, architects, designers, community residents, civic and political leaders, and funding agencies.⁷¹

For the purposes of this unit and the particular course designed to focus on three-dimensional art, public art will be broken down into four main categories: memorials, monuments, murals, and functional public art (including “street furniture,” transit stations, and other “usable” architectural work). Murals will not play a large role in the content of this unit, but adjustments to include more information on murals could certainly be made relatively easily.

A public memorial seems to inspire remembrance of a person, group of people, or a specific event, whereas a monument seems to pay tribute to an important person, group of people, or specific event. At first glance, the differences seem minimal, and it is fairly unexpected that resources on public art seem to avoid blatantly addressing the distinction between the two. Therefore, hashing out the differences and similarities between memorials and monuments will prove to be a beneficial activity for students.

Murals, on the other hand, are a much more self-explanatory form of public art…but it is their interaction with and formation of the community surrounding them that can take a mural out of the context of being nothing more than a flat, two-dimensional painting which creates a relatively short and shallow experience of a viewer looking and then moving on. Furthermore, murals tend to serve two radically different purposes: social protest and civic boosterism.⁷² These two different emergences of public murals are certainly worth exploring with students as they not only further demonstrate the versatility and power of public art, but they also provide a connection with guerilla art and the notion of placemaking.

“Functional” public art, for the purposes of this unit, includes many different types of art, from furniture to transit stations and other art installations. Gateways, benches, streetlights, and fences can all fall within this category, as well. These types of works serve a dual role in that possess an aesthetic presence but they also serve a practical purpose; the audience is both viewer and user.