Art & Community Landscapes

OVERVIEW

Art & Community Landscapes (ACL) was a partnership of New England Foundation for the Arts (NEFA), the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) and National Park Service (NPS).

ACL supported site-based public art as a catalyst for increased environmental awareness and stewardship. The program addressed the natural environment through site-specific art projects including temporary or permanent art installations, exhibitions, interpretive media, festivals, or other works informed by the site and community in which the project is located.

Project sites and partner organizations were selected to work closely with an artist or artist team for one year or longer. Together, the artist and partner organization developed and implemented a publicly accessible project that inspires greater community involvement in protecting and enhancing the natural environment. For images of past projects, view the Art & Community Landscapes report.

Program Goals:

• Support artists to work with community-based collaborators to stimulate and advance environmental awareness through the process of experiencing or making art
• Bring diverse community members together to participate in site-based art projects that address local and regional environmental concerns
• Support cross-disciplinary approaches to the creative process that are mutually informative and may elicit new outcomes and models of partnership

How were project sites and artists selected?
ACL project sites were pre-selected in collaboration with the National Park Service and local community art and environment advocacy organizations. Project sites were selected by a panel including representatives from the fields of art, environment, community building and neighborhood development as well as ACL program and partner staff.

ACL's artists were selected in a two-step process. Interested artists were asked to submit qualification materials. From these initial applications, a jury panel selected three artists or artist-teams for each project to receive planning grant funding. Planning grant recipients then developed project proposals, and one artist or artist-team was selected for each project to receive a $50,000 implementation grant.

Will there be future opportunities for art and environment projects?
The New England Foundation for the Arts is interested in continuing to support public art projects that inspire environmental awareness. Please see our Public Art pages for more information on our current programs and services or contact the Public Art Coordinator at publicart@nefa.org or [617] 951-0010 ext. 528.

GRANTEES

Cycle 4 grantees (2007-2008)

Project: Concord River Greenway Public Art: Bridges and Gateways (Lowell, Massachusetts)
Partner: Lowell Parks & Conservation Trust
Artist: Wopo Holup (Lyons, CO)
Site: Concord River Greenway
The Concord River Greenway is a 1.75-mile multi-use trail along the eastern bank of the Concord River, from Lawrence Street near the Lowell Cemetery to downtown Lowell. The City of Lowell is in the process of acquiring the land for the corridor, which will be open to the public. The trail will include both an upper paved, multi-use, accessible path as well as an informal lower, natural, walking path along the riverbank.
The Concord River Greenway will provide vital open space in Lowell’s diverse neighborhoods and will be an important link in Lowell’s interconnected systems of river and canal trails as well as a larger regional trail system that includes the Bruce Freeman Trail and the Bay Circuit Trail.

"A Public Art Plan for the Greenway" developed by artists Mags Harries and Lajos Heder identifies general design principles and opportunities for incorporating art along the greenway. The Public Art Plan was funded in part by a grant from the Fund for the Arts, a restricted fund of the New England Foundation for the Arts.  The ACL project has commissioned Wopo Holup to work with the engineering/landscape architecture team (EarthTech and BSC Group), the community and other partners to incorporate thematic elements in the actual design of bridges and gateways. The project will engage and celebrate the community’s history, diverse cultures and ecology.

Project: Mozart Park Public Art Project (Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts)
Partner: Hyde Square Task Force
Artist: Doug Kornfeld (Cambridge, MA), Helen Duncan (Boston, MA)
Site: Mozart Park, Center Street
In 2007 the Hyde Square Task Force received a Fund for the Arts grant of $25,000 for mural along a 100-yard brick wall in Mozart Park. Working under the supervision of muralist, Roberto Chao, the mural will be designed and painted by local youth, who in recent years have responded to violence in the neighborhood by creating art that transforms public areas where violence occurs.

Following this project the Hyde Square Task Force received Art & Community Landscapes support to engage an artist in a separate public art element for Mozart Park on Center Street in Jamaica Plain. Artist, Doug Kornfeld, has been selected to work with the youth and community on a gateway design for the park. In addition to the park element, youth will participate directly in the artist’s process learning computer and web design skills through workshops by the artist.

PARTNERS & FUNDERS

Partners
ACL is a unique three-way partnership between the National Park Service, NEFA, and the National Endowment for the Arts. NEFA is the lead administrator of ACL, and works closely with NPS and NEA staff to select resident artists and help implement their projects.

Funders

• ACL has been made possible with generous support from:
• National Park Service
• National Endowment for the Arts
• James Irvine Foundation
• Anonymous