Public Art Goes Public
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“In order to effectuate these changes I had to put [the department] at risk,” Hodes says. “And the at-risk piece of that lawsuit was the nexus with Gallery 37.” He discovered it thanks to a suit he settled with the city three years ago. In that settlement Cultural Affairs agreed to publish an annual financial report for the public art program, which is funded–to the tune of millions–by a 1.33 percent share of the cost of all city building and remodeling projects. Hodes says when he began receiving the reports he noticed that money–about $100,000 in 2002–was being moved from the public art program into Gallery 37 (Maggie Daley’s pet program), where “they claimed some of it was [used] for teaching.” “We felt it was not inappropriate to employ apprentice artists to work alongside professional artists,” says Cultural Affairs spokesperson Kimberly Costello. But while teaching is admirable, Hodes says, “there’s no provision at all in the public art program to spend money to train artists.”
Under the terms of the new settlement, the city will open meetings of the once mysterious public art committee and its advisory panels to the public and will post meeting dates on its Web site in advance. It’s also required to post agendas at least 48 hours prior to meetings and post minutes, including a record of all votes–and voters–within seven days of each meeting. Within 30 days of the settlement the city is to begin posting lists of all planned commissions and purchases valued at more than $10,000, along with the stipulations, funding, and selection process. The city will also itemize the 20 percent of each project’s cost dedicated to administration and maintenance. And within 60 days the city is to adopt and post written program guidelines. The guidelines will explain criteria for the selection of committee and panel members, factors considered in selecting artwork, and information for artists on how to get their work into the program’s slide registry.
Among Hodes’s beefs about how the city treats its artists is one about Millennium Park. “The city had an opportunity to really do something for local artists there,” he says. “Did they? No.” But he may have been tossed another bone. Two weeks ago the city opened a visitors’ center in the Exelon Pavilion–the little corporate showplace just west of the Harris Theater–with the first permanent Millennium Park installation by Chicago artists. Heliosphere–Biosphere–Technosphere, by Adelheid Mers and Patrick McGee, consists of three mirrored disks visible from the street that light up at night and digitally display the amount of electricity generated by solar panels on the building’s surface (supposedly enough to run three Chicago homes). Millennium Park design director Ed Uhlir says park officials suggested to Exelon last winter that it might be nicer to have work by Chicago artists than the expanded Museum of Science and Industry-style energy exhibit that had been planned for the space. Mers and McGee and three other artists were chosen from the public art registry to submit proposals for the project, the total cost of which was $65,000. After the husband-and-wife team won the commission, they had about six weeks to build it. Uhlir says the project was fast-tracked. “Exelon paid; it wasn’t part of the public art program.”
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photos/Robert Drea.
