Archinect - News

Monument Lab announces major new commission on the National Mall in Washington

2023-07-26T15:49:00-04:00

Philadelphia-based studio Monument Lab has been announced as the curatorial leader of a new public art installation on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

The pilot exhibition of the Trust’s new Beyond Granite series will be on view for a month (August 18th to September 18th) and feature a response to the program’s thematic question about whose stories “remain untold” at the important site using a selection of six prototype monuments designed by artists Wendy Red Star, Derrick Adams, vanessa german, Ashon T. Crawley, Tiffany Chung, and Paul Ramírez Jonas.

Monument Lab founding Director Paul Farber and last year’s Pulitzer Prize for Criticism winner Salamishah Tillet are co-curating the exhibition and say it will treat the monuments as “a statement of power and presence in public.”

“Beyond Granite: Pulling Together builds out platforms for artist-led civic engagement, historical interpretation, and storytelling as a means for advancing what it means to imagine, build, live, and g...

On the twisted development of Los Angeles' avoidable 'baked-in" freeway system

2022-06-14T11:15:00-04:00

Can you imagine a version of Los Angeles with even more highway veins pursed throughout its (formerly) Bohemian coastline, super-industrial downtown core, and crisscrossing network of foothills? The reality of what could easily have been (save for the opposition of several big-name celebrities and politicians) is being explored by the LA Times’ new editorial series called ‘‘Explaining L.A. With Patt Morrison.’

In last week’s edition, the writer took to the freeway for a delve into its post-war sources of federal funding (90% of the system here was underwritten through the Eisenhower administration’s nationwide interstate expansion effort), and potential alternatives that included multiple Parkway designs that caught on much easier in Northeast states like New Jersey, Maine, and Connecticut during the same period.

Figures like Randolph Collier and George Gordon Whitnall come into the fore to foil more practic...

National Trust leads effort to protect HBCU campuses

2020-07-31T14:17:00-04:00

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, National Endowment for the Humanities, Ford Foundation, The JPB Foundation, J.M. Kaplan Fund, and The Executive Leadership Council are collaborating on a $1 million pilot project that aims to develop conservation and preservation plans for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs).

The so-called HBCU Cultural Heritage Stewardship Initiative is an outgrowth of the National Trust's African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund, a $25 million initiative billed as "the largest preservation campaign ever undertaken on behalf of African American history."

Previously on Archinect: "As Historically Black Colleges and Universities shutter, America loses its history."The remnants of Morristown College, which is listed in the National Register of Historic Places and shuttered in 1994. Image courtesy of Wikimedia user Bravidos.

A statement published by the National Trust explains, "The historic buildings and landscapes on HBCU campuses—m...

Artist wants to transform Chicago dump site into sculpture garden for dismantled monuments

2020-07-13T11:48:00-04:00

Conceptual artist JB Daniel wants to transform a Chicago landfill site near the Calumet River into a sculpture park to house all of the toppled monuments from recent protests, reports The Art Newspaper.

The artist proposes the statues be installed in their topped states with their unoccupied pedestals nearby. According to The Art Newspaper, Daniel added that the park would educate visitors about the country's controversial past and would serve to inform future generations to come.