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Austin360 blogs > Austin Arts: Seeing Things > Archives > 2010 > April > 20 > Entry
Sometimes, it takes a knitter…
Let’s face it: Public art is problematic. There’s some pretty awful stuff out there — some pretty ill-conceived stuff too.
That’s certainly true of ‘Moments,’ the piece by architect Carl Trominski that went up along the underpass at the 300 block Lamar Boulevard where the busy street dips below some railroad tracks. Commissioned by the city of Austin’s Art in Public Places program in 2003, ‘Moments’ is a series of 21 blue wordless, numberless signs afixed at regular intervals along both sides of the underpass.
‘Moments’ cost the city $45,000, with monies coming from the hotel and motel taxes. And since its installation, it seems that most people who have encountered it don’t know what it is or think it’s just some kind of odd signage. In fact, here at the newspaper we regularly get calls and emails asking what the heck the thing is.
What it is at best is under-developed and short on artistic concept. It misses the mark, big time. ‘Moments’ fails to be a moment.
Isn’t it wonderful then that artist Magda Sayeg has chosen to ‘yarn bomb’ it with one of her knitted pieces of ‘yarn graffiti.’
The founder of Knitta Please, Sayeg began deploying yarn bombs around Houston in 2005, a reaction to the city’s often inhuman urban landscape. My favorite was one I encountered wrapped around support pole on a Hwy. 59 overpass.
The yarn bombs are also a part of greater trend of younger artists who chose to embrace traditional craft-making as their medium, bringing new life and appreciation to formerly ‘domestic hobbies.’ Jenny Hart, an Austin artist whose main medium is embroidery is another such artist.
With Trominski’s permission, Sayeg’s covered ‘Moments’ with her knitted treasures, using wild, vivid patterns reminiscent of 1970s homemade afghans.
Sayeg’s project is a commission from the non-profit support organization Art Alliance Austin as part of Art Week Austin. It’ll come down after the events end on Sunday.
Still, soometimes, all it takes is a knitter to fix public art gone bad.
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