Calgary’s public art makes presence felt
Unveiling of new sculpture a clear sign of urban transformation
CALGARY— Public art isn’t what it used to be. No longer are we satisfied simply looking; now we want to be engaged, interacted with and involved.
Just as well, contemporary artists would rather pose questions than give answers.
That’s why the days of bronzed memorials of monarchs and messiahs are over. Though it’s acceptable for artists to incorporate utility into their work, meaning is up for grabs.
The sculpture by Barcelonabased Jaume Plensa unveiled recently in front of the new Bow Building in downtown Calgary is a good example. Depicting a young girl’s head, 12 metres high and rendered in white bent-wire, this enigmatic bust gazes serenely at the comings and goings of a city starting to flex its urban muscles.
Plensa’s piece, titled Wonderland, is one of those artworks whose utter directness belies its subtle complexity, not to mention its outlandishness. The juxtapositions of form and content, scale and subject, presence and absence, provoke a more nuanced response than the casual passerby might have expected.
The choice of material, for instance, sets up one of the basic contradictions of the work. From a distance, the head seems almost opaque, the steel mesh resolves into a solid surface and the soft curves and contours of the face and hair are revealed.
Up close, however, the sense of solidity evaporates, giving way to something that appears flimsy, almost non-existent. The image dissolves into an abstract grid of mesh, a map of a human head
Curiously, Plensa has added two door-sized openings that enable visitors literally to wander through
Wonderland. This is something Calgarians do with remarkable frequency. Any hour of the day or night it seems someone’s there, taking photographs or just wanting to take in the full experience of walking through the piece.
Had these entrances not been included, which would traditionally have been the case, our relationship with the piece would be different. Wonderland would have remained a fascinating object that lay forever just beyond our reach. But because we can enter into the artist’s head, and peer at the world from the inside out, we are able to “possess” the work, or at least view things from its point of view. Scale also contributes to the appeal of the piece. Reaching three or four storeys high, the head of a young girl turns into something quite striking; every tiny detail acquires an almost geological quality. Indeed, up close, the work resembles some sort of giant globe. “My vision for Wonderland is to inspire everyone who experiences the sculpture,” Plensa said last year when installation began. “I believe the architecture of our bodies is the palace for our dreams.” Who would argue with that? Ultimately, however, like everything Plensa produces, Wonder
land remains a mystery. It is unexpected, even novel, but also compelling, certainly impossible to ignore. Like another great piece of public art, Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate at Chicago’s Millennium Park, Won
derland exemplifies a simplicity of approach that would send most artists running. Kapoor’s shiny perfect sculpture — known locally as “The Bean” because of its shape — sits there, silently reflecting everything around it.
“My vision for Wonderland is to inspire everyone who experiences the sculpture.”
JAUME PLENSA
Plensa’s Millennium Park contribution, Crown Fountain, is Chicago’s other crowd-pleaser. With its stone fountain, dual glass-block towers and ever-changing LED imagery, it is never the same piece twice. Also like Kapoor, Plensa has an international reputation; his work can be found in cities around the globe including New York, London and Rio de Janeiro. Toronto’s Plensa is a neon wall piece that hangs in the carousel hall at Pearson International Airport.
Not far from the Bow, another Spaniard, Santiago Calatrava, has also done his bit for Calgary’s civic transformation. The exquisite and initially controversial Peace Bridge, which he designed, marks the city as one interested and willing to spend money to enhance its public realm.
Even in these most urban of times, many fail to grasp the impact that art can have on residents and visitors and cities. Yet it should come as no surprise that we are drawn, everyone one of us, to pleasure and practicality. There’s as much engineering in Plensa’s head as there is art in Calatrava’s bridge.
Both are the means as well as the end, and in each case, getting there is half the fun.