Annual program gives NYC artists chance to create public art

NEW YORK -- There was the project that turned a Manhattan intersection into a baseball diamond, and another that converted a subway station into a Venetian canal. And then there was the magic carpet placed in a park, replicating the floor plan of a Brooklyn apartment.\nThanks to a unique arts program, emerging artists are getting a chance to place their work in an unusual gallery -- the streets and public spaces of New York City.\n"In the Public Realm," now in its 12th year, is a program of the Public Art Fund, a nonprofit organization that takes art beyond the walls of museums and similar institutions. The organization does plenty of exhibitions with major artists, but "In the Public Realm" specifically tries to give opportunities to less-established names -- those who haven't done much work in public spaces.\n"It's really important to us that we're not just showcasing the household names, but also helping to develop the pool," said Rochelle Steiner, the organization's director.\nEvery year, the organization receives several hundred responses when it puts out a call for applicants, who have until the Feb. 9 deadline to respond. A panel reviews the applicants and evaluates their work.\nTen are selected to develop proposals, with each asked to consider where in the nation's largest city they would want to put it -- a park perhaps, or a busy intersection. By the end of the summer, three final projects are chosen.\nThe selected artists get a stipend of $2,500, and up to $15,000 to put the project together, while the Public Art Fund provides guidance, publicity and support to secure all the necessary city permits.\nThe works are displayed temporarily over the next year.\nThe fund's efforts are vital, said Nina Katchadourian, the most recent artist to have her work exhibited. Her project, "Office Semaphore," which just finished its run, put a telescope in Lower Manhattan that looked into a man's office. Every day, the man placed different objects into his window that translated into specific messages for the viewers.\nTrying to get all the necessary permissions to produce the project would have been impossible on her own, Katchadourian said.\n"I frankly would not have bothered to realize it without them," she said.\nFor Josiah McElheny, the experience was transforming. He was already making a name for himself as an artist, but had never done a project in a public space. His 2001 effort, "The Metal Party," was an interactive work that invited viewers to don a special costume and take part in recreating a party organized by Bauhaus students in 1929.\n"For me as an artist, it was a huge leap of faith in terms of the scale of it. ... It was perhaps the most complex thing I've ever done," he said. "It was a big turning point for me; this piece really changed all my work."\nPublic art is not for the faint of heart, said Kate Levin, commissioner of the city's Department of Cultural Affairs, which gives some funding to the Public Art Fund.\nCreating a piece that works in a 3-D space with much potential pedestrian or automotive traffic isn't something learned in a studio, she observed. The only way to figure out how to do it is to actually do it, which makes the Public Art Fund's program so valuable.\nIt "is a really exciting opportunity to let artists do the real thing," she said. "There's no substitute for actually making work that then goes into the public realm"