Every Beating Second

Former PAN Council member and Year in Review Award winner, Janet Echelman’s Every Beating Second, just premiered at Terminal 2 in the San Francisco Airport. Additional SFO artworks will be highlighted in the Travelers as Cultural Audience Public Art Preconference Session.

While all of that work is already being spotlighted at this year's Americans for the Arts Annual Convention, you still have time to share that spotlight.

The 2011 Public Art Network Year in Review is accepting project submissions until next Friday, April 22, 2011.  

Madame Curie

Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego has commissioned Jennifer Steinkamp to create a new work for MCASD Downtown’s Joan and Irwin Jacobs Building.

Entitled Madame Curie, this new commission is inspired by Steinkamp’s recent research into atomic energy, atomic explosions, and the effects of these forces on nature.

Marie Curie was the recipient of two Nobel Prizes for creating the theory of radioactivity, and discovering radium and polonium.  

Sahar Javedani

I am an artist.

I am an administrator.

I am a teacher.

I am an advocate.

My destined path of arts education and advocacy began at an early age.

As the child of an Iranian architect and set designer, I have actively participated in the arts throughout my upbringing.

Raised in Encinitas in North County San Diego, California, my youth consisted of participating in community theater productions, conferences, and competitions. When it came time to decide on my academic future, I knew with 100% confidence that I would pursue a career in the performing arts.  

Michael Killoren

The following is an extended version of our Q&A session with Michael Killoren, Director of Local Arts Agencies and Challenge America Fast Track at the National Endowment for the Arts, featured in the current issue of Arts Link, our quarterly member newsletter.

To find out more about the benefits of becoming a member of Americans for the Arts, visit our Membership page:

What is your overall role as the director of Local Arts Agencies and Challenge America Fast Track at the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA)?

I’m responsible for the oversight and management of these two program areas, in alignment with the new strategic direction under the “Art Works” guiding principle.

You transitioned last fall to the NEA from the Mayor’s Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs in Seattle. What’s it like to move from a local or regional organization to one with a national reach?

Helen Lessick

There are three reasons public art file searches are performed: Cultural Tourism, Community Practice, and Critical Assessment.

1. Cultural Tourism: Where is the artwork (GPS/location info), what is it (art work title sometimes is what is being searched), who made it (artist’s name), and what does it look like (a clear image of piece as experienced by the viewer)?

2. Community Practice: How the community achieves the project, a lessons-learned toolkit, documenting what was done, who did it, and how. This type of material includes artist selection, proposal, contacts, contracts, maintenance report, community engagement, and fabrication records.

3. Critical Assessment: These are materials generated outside the work of the artist and any commissioning agency. They may include critical writing mentioning the project, press releases, art dedication, and project description. Currently, art administration educators and their TAs are building courses about our practice. Art critics and bloggers are writing about stuff in public. Professional media outlets seem to shout the loudest, and turn up first in online searches.