"Public Art in Airports: Defining a Sense of Place"

Sunday, February 6, 2005

DEBATING THE VALLEY'S IDENTITY
By Tracey Kaplan
The San Jose (CA) Mercury News


A generation ago, public art in airports leaned toward the prosaic -- bland
displays that blended into the background as travelers rushed from gate to
baggage claim to taxicab.

Today, airport art commands as much attention as the buildings themselves,
defining a sense of place for first-time visitors. A fountain in Denver's
airport spouts a spectacular likeness of the Rocky Mountain range; a series
of enormous candy-color towers and letters at Los Angeles' airport evoke the
Hollywood sign; and a milelong floor embedded with seashells at Miami's
airport brings to mind South Florida's beaches.

Over the next few years, as San Jose's airport evolves from a mere pit stop
for planes into a contemporary landmark, the facility will face a pressing
and expensive question: What sort of art should define the gateway to
Silicon Valley?

With millions of dollars at stake, a debate already is under way over who
should be entrusted to help make that decision. In the coming months, the
arts commission will appoint up to eight people who will play a key role --
from interpreting the ``technology and art'' theme previously approved by
the San Jose City Council, to recommending the actual artwork.

``The airport is more than just a bus station, it's the front door to your
city,'' said Susan Pontious, an arts official in San Francisco, which spent
$9 million on art as part of that city's recent airport expansion. ``The art
you choose will certainly promote San Jose and its identity.''

Nationwide, the creation of airport art has been on the rise, because more
than 300 cities, states and counties now require a percentage of their
civic-improvement budgets to be spent on public art and many of those places
also have been updating their airports.

San Jose, which requires 2 percent to be set aside, could spend up to $10
million on airport art, beginning with $3.89 million for the first phase,
the wing-shape north concourse. The art will be funded by airport revenue,
including concessions and landing fees, not out of the city's general fund.

Artists and civic boosters alike see the art as an opportunity to make a
lasting impression on passengers who are forced to arrive earlier and spend
more time at airports since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Last year, about
11.1 million people passed through Mineta San Jose International Airport,
more than 50 times as many as the 200,000 who visited the San Jose Museum of
Art.

Controversial

The more daring the airport art, the more controversy it sparks.

In Los Angeles, architect Ted Tokio Tanaka calls the colorful 25- to
100-foot-tall towers that ring the airport an ``Electronic Stonehenge.'' But
some residents say the towers more closely resemble giant illuminated
toilet-paper tubes.

In San Jose, public art has a contentious history. In 1990, a statue of
Capt. Thomas Fallon, who raised the American flag over San Jose in 1846, was
mothballed for a decade after some opposed it as a racist symbol of American
imperialism. A statue of the Aztec god Quetzalcoatl has been the subject of
debate since it was dedicated at Plaza de Cesar Chavez in 1994.
Fundamentalists said the statue celebrated evil, while others called it an
embarrassment to the city.

As a result of the uproar over those two projects, most art that receives
city funds goes through a public comment process. Since then, San Jose has
managed to spend about $21 million on public art without stirring up much
controversy, including $4 million for a fountain that will be built at the
new City Hall, along with a processional of 10 ``floats'' on pedestals and
six related columns that will feature themes relevant to the region.

But debate over the airport art has festered for more than four years. The
issue pits aviation buffs who favor more traditional art against artists and
techies who support newer forms of digital, visual and information media,
including robotics and interactive installations.

Last year, the city council tried to resolve the question by approving a
master plan that favored the more avant-garde approach. The plan calls for
the project to ``identify San Jose as a diverse global center for innovation
and change'' through an art-and-technology program.

Exclusion concerns

But critics of the plan haven't given up. Their current beef is with the
city's office of cultural affairs, which recommended barring them and anyone
else who served on an earlier, highly divisive steering committee from also
serving on the new oversight committee.

Airport commissioner Catherine Matsuyo Tompkison-Graham strongly objects to
the exclusion effort and said aviation interests should play a bigger role
in airport art decisions. As it stands, the airport commission gets to
appoint one member of the oversight committee, while the arts commission
appoints the other eight. In a letter to Councilwoman Judy Chirco last
month, Tompkison-Graham also accused the city's arts staff of failing to
sufficiently include the public in the airport art process in the past.

Although the city council will approve the airport art, the oversight
committee and the arts commission will make key decisions, such as
soliciting proposals from artists for concepts of their choice. That could
include anything from commissioning artwork embedded in the floor of the
concourse to an outdoor piece that demonstrates the power of wind.

In contrast, in San Francisco, both the airport and the art commissions
played an equal role in that city's airport art project, and the city
council did not have a say, Pontious said.

Critics fear that by putting the emphasis on technology, the oversight
committee will recommend artwork composed of ugly plasma screens that will
ignore the valley's aviation history and agricultural past, will require
high-cost maintenance and will quickly become passe.

``If we didn't have an airport, high-tech would have had no way to bring in
the things they need,'' said former airport commissioner Sharon Sweeney.
``We're really worried that they'll ignore the old and rewrite history.''

But city arts officials and the four people who have been nominated so far
for the oversight committee said critics have nothing to fear. The
commission is still seeking nominations, this time open to Santa Clara
County residents only, and the Airport Commission may be able to add more
appointees.

``What I'm looking for is content that comments on the human condition, not
something that highlights the latest technology,'' said Richard Rinehart,
the director of digital media at the University of California Berkeley
Museum of Art and a committee nominee.

Role of artwork

Barbara Goldstein, the city's public art director, said the art and
technology theme means the artwork can range from merely commenting on how
scientific advances affect everyday life to actually incorporating
technology.

At Seattle's Cedar River Watershed Education Center, for example, a piece
commissioned by the city subtly uses technology to highlight the power of
water. Artist Dan Corson created a ring of drums that play when it rains. On
rainless days, a computerized irrigation system releases water droplets onto
the drumheads and can be programmed to play rhythms from around the world.
Corson also turned tree root balls dug from the watershed into hanging
sculptures, interlaced with strands of illuminated, gas-filled glass that
mimics the flow of water.

At San Jose's airport, the possibilities range from a landscape piece that
is visible from the air and ties in nearby Guadalupe Creek, to a wind-driven
sculpture, to a glass piece embedded with digital photos, Goldstein said.

The selections won't be secret; the public will be made aware of all
recommendations before any art becomes part of the airport, Jerry Allen,
deputy director of the city's Office of Cultural Affairs, said in a memo to
the mayor and city council last week.

``People are scared. It's reasonable,'' Goldstein said. ``But I feel very
confident people are going to get excited and the things we do will be
absolutely beautiful.''


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