CONTRIBUTED PHOTO
Tree of Life, 2004, Douglas Kornfield, Clinton Avenue School courtyard
The City of New Haven is offering a new opportunity for area artists through a special program with a long history.
We Shall Overcome 2002, Winfred Rembert, Lincoln-Bassett School
Andrew Wolf, New Haven’s director of arts, culture and tourism, has announced a call to artists for a new commissioned artwork. “Mayor Harp is a true champion of Percent for Arts,” he said, “and looks forward to the addition of another exciting installation in 2015.”
The call is for a piece of artwork to adorn the Helene Grant School being renovated on Goffe Street.
What is Percent for Arts?
Before the city began its $1.6 billion mission of remodeling or creating all new public-school buildings, and long before the school reform movement took hold in earnest, New Haven was the first city in the state to enact an art-for-public-spaces ordinance called the Percent for Art in Public Spaces Program. (The photos in this story show some of the works that have been commissioned.)
As early as 1981, recognizing the role of public art in enhancing quality of life, the city passed legislation requiring that 1 percent of city construction costs for all new or remodeled projects be set aside for commissioned art work at its municipal buildings — schools, fire stations, libraries, parks, and other public spaces.
Over 31 works of art, commissioned from local and regional artists, have been integrated into the places most central to the city’s daily life and culture, becoming important symbols of the city’s ideals as they reflect and enhance the environs in which they are installed.
You are order, I am chaos, (2006) Jose Rodriguez, John Daniels School courtyard
The city is now seeking submissions for a site-specific public artwork for a public school presently undergoing renovation. Though it gives preference to Connecticut-based artists or those in the tri-state area, it encourages all artists to submit portfolios for consideration in any medium and has laid out guidelines for doing so.
Further details regarding the submission guidelines can be found in the Arts Council Bulletin.
Jan. 15 is the recommended deadline, though artists could still be considered if they submit by the end of the month. Portfolios will also be accepted into the city’s artist registry on an ongoing basis for consideration in any future opportunities.
Sky of Writing / Sky of Dreams / Sky of Delight (2003), Suikang Zhao, Celentano School
As Wolf gears up for his first year of programming as New Haven’s arts czar, the new call under Percent for Art represents a chance for artists to use a part of the city as their canvas — as many have before them.
Please check my math. Hopefully it is in error
Is it possible that in another series of wasteful subsidies to the Ahhts Community, we have tossed $16 million to 31 artistes during the recent programs for rehabilitation of New Haven Schools as this story says?
That is an average of about half million bucks on each project. WOW!!!
I'll grant that some, illustrated above, look pretty good, but not at that price!! None are worth a half million bucks as I see it.
---and look the poster-like art at Lincoln - Bassett School. Looks like a couple of days work from a high-school or maybe a talented grammar school arts- striver.
The poor taxpayers are getting ripped off again as I see it.=== and as construction costs go up, so too do the increases in the amount tosses to this group
---and this is being topped, per another arts group fantasy touted recently in the Independent--a proposed new tax on hotel- users to be used ,not for heat for the victims of our current freeze or other urgent needs, but handed to the arts groups to squander as they wish.
They are much too greedy! Time for a revolt from New Haven Taxpayers.
Have been taken for suckers enough!!
If you agree talk to your Alderperson.