The Infrastructure of Public Art

The Infrastructure of Public Art

While waiting on tenants to leave the Creative Spark building on Tuesday night so I could lock up, I spotted a little booklet.

Produced by Create, the national development agency for collaborative arts in Ireland it contained some very relevant little nuggets of information.

A set of principles for commissioning, a nod to Situations – The Rules of Public Art or Mary Jane Jacob’s curatorial toolkit. The principles are:

To Create a Supportive Environment – to set up opportunities to explore and experiment without expectation but with understanding and friendship.

To Listen (Deeply) – Not just to the concept but to the artist as an individual, their motivations, personal interests, life stages and similarly to listen to participants, collaborators, and council staff. To listen to the national and international shifts and changes, subtle or otherwise, that can inform or affect positioning of an artist, or idea at any given time.

To Trust – in the potential of the unrealised idea and create opportunities for this trust to be extended to all involved. This trust extends to the support of ‘risk’.

To Care – about the process and the idea, to mind it and encourage others to value that it is being cared for.

(Crowley, 2018)

Inspirational words of relevance.