Artwork Curtain Call selected for downtown St. Catharines
A multi-coloured permanent public artwork paying tribute to Indigenous people, cultural diversity and the arts will grace the side of the First-Ontario Performing Arts Centre next spring.
Curtain Call by Lilly Otasevic was chosen by a design selection committee and approved by city council last week for the Carlisle Street Public Art Project.
The piece will be a composition of enlarged wampum-like beads constructed of painted aluminium that form a wavy fabric. It will span approximately 15 to 17 metres wide and be 4.5 metres high. The cost is $75,000 plus HST for fabrication and installation. It’s being funded through carryover from the capital budget for the construction of the arts centre, which opened in November 2015, and through a grant from the department of Canadian Heritage’s Canada 150 Legacy Fund.
The city issued calls for expressions of interest in May 2017 and received 28 submissions. A design selection panel comprising of members of the city’s public art advisory committee, city staff and members of the local indigenous community shortlisted six artists.
Of the six, four artists provided design submissions for a final piece of artwork. They were reviewed by the design selection panel which ultimately chose Otasevic’s piece.
Otasevic’s submission said she drew inspiration from the historical presence of indigenous peoples and used the wampum bead as the building block for her sculpture, according to a report by city staff.
She exaggerated the size of a bead to weave a wavy fabric incorporating random colours that reflect demographic and cultural diversity.
“The randomness of colours represents interconnectedness of different people from diverse locations in the world that came and became part of our contemporary social fabric. This is a continuously changing, organic dynamic,” she wrote.
The wavy shape symbolizes the lake and water for prosperity, but is also reference to a theatre curtain. She wrote the fabric look also pays homage to the late Marilyn I. Walker who was a fibre artist who influenced the arts and culture of St. Catharines.
The Toronto-based artist has completed other indoor and outdoor public art projects in Waterloo, Burlington, Toronto and Pickering.
Fabrication of the work is expected to begin this fall and it will be installed in the spring.
It is the fourth public artwork commissioned by the city.