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614 Public Art<br />

Inukshuk sculpture at English Bay in Vancouver, Canada. Constructed originally by Alvin Kanak of Rankin Inlet, this monument was<br />

commissioned by the Government of the Northwest Territories for its pavilion at Expo 86 and given to the City of Vancouver.<br />

Source: Karen Wiley.<br />

advertising of gallery art), yet is now ubiquitous in<br />

efforts to revive urban economies. Public art is<br />

seen by developers and city authorities as bringing<br />

the universal value of culture, identified traditionally<br />

as a public good, to schemes to improve the<br />

appearance and safety of declining city districts.<br />

Beginnings<br />

Public art began in the United States in 1967,<br />

when the National Endowment for the Arts<br />

(NEA) instituted a fund specific to the support of<br />

commissions for art in public places. The first<br />

commission was for Alexander Calder’s sculpture<br />

La Grande Vitesse for Grand Rapids, Michigan. A<br />

two­dimensional representation of this is now the<br />

city’s logo. This set a tone for public art as big<br />

sculpture, the kind of work that few collectors or<br />

museums could accommodate but that suited open<br />

city squares. Following this, <strong>cities</strong> from New York<br />

to Chicago and Seattle commissioned works from<br />

well­known European and North American artists<br />

including Marc Chagall, Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso,<br />

Jean Dubuffet, Richard Serra, and Jonathan

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