Public art is complicated. It can be official – a mural, monument, or other installation. The creation and placement of official public art is not cheap and is usually handled with significant deliberation or decided by social and/or political forces. The removal of official public art is also usually a significant event, showing shifts or conflicts within the values and character of a society.
Public art can also be unofficial – such as graffiti.
Public art often commemorates a person, event, or idea or might simply add to the aesthetics of an area. Always, however, public art is a deliberate act that communicates something about the society around it.
During an SRAS-arranged walking tour of central St. Petersburg, our guide, Sergei, pointed across the Neva River to the Quay with Sphinxes, a little outpost on the University Embankment near house number 17. The site displays two massive sphinxes that are carved out of pink granite and weigh about 23 tons each. I was so […]