The project offered a tidy sum of money to the artist chosen to create the artwork for the building, so of course, it was a VERY attractive project to consider.
I made my application with samples of my work thus far, but also included my 'Vision Statement' for what my plan would be if I was awarded a prize to create the art.
I think I remember that they hadn't decided if they would award to only one artist, one artistic or design group or both or left the door open to all possibilities. They wanted the submissions first.
Well, long story short--these are the images of artwork I submitted with my application. I had in mind a direction different than these examples and said so in my Vision Statement. I proposed to make 'sculptures' and paintings made from recycled paper medium that would provide for a lot of texture.
The concept that was put forth in the contest was that this would be artwork families who were coming to identify bodies of their now dead love ones would encounter.
I proposed soothing curving textures, no sharp edges (ala Niki De Saint Phalle), primary, bright colors and touchable textures. The idea was that the curves would be soothing. If touchable, people could even run their hands over the smooth curves for comfort and the bright colors would be uplifting (or maybe I would have used Earth Tones, who knows)
I tried to inquire in follow up what the outcome of the contest was and was told there was some 'problem', maybe they even mumbled something about a controversy over the prize money or something. I didn't get much of a straight answer and just sort of felt, well I tried. They probably were planning on giving it to an 'insider' anyway, but I had to make the effort. I set it all aside.
But I realized recently as I was looking at a slideshow I created for this blog, that I used the images from the application.
I decided to write a blog entry about this, figuring some would be familiar with the TV show and it might be mildly interesting. I did a search for an article that might have been written up about the contest or who was awarded the project, but couldn't get past all the Casey Anthony references to Dr. G Medical Examiner.
I purposely avoided getting sucked in to the Casey Anthony ordeal, so I hate to feel like an out of touch idiot---I had no idea that our Medical Examiner would have been THE Medical Examiner for this case.
So, if anyone knows or remembers anything about the contest or if anyone was ever awarded the project, I'd love to know. The trial has now over shadowed everything in the 'internet search' world, so I doubt I will be able to find a link about the art contest in any timely manner.
In the mean time, these are the images I submitted, although I was taking a gamble including the skeleton artwork....
Niki De Saint Phalle on Amazon
