Diverse Art Highlights 2012 Sculpture Series

The 26th annual and Student Sculpture Project opened Sunday with a reception at Centennial Commons. The projects will remain up until September for public viewing. 

Sculpture students from Wash U’s Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts competed for this opportunity by developing proposal and models, along with budgets, presented to the University City Municipal Arts & Letters Commission.

This year’s line-up includes: 

Domestic and Wild

A project by Aly Strubberg proposes to help “show the viewer the dichotomy of wild nature and domestic nature,” according to Strubberg, who combines a series of wooden doors with the already existing flora seen in between the playground and the creek in .

QR City

The southern part of hosts “QR City” by Melissa Gollance, featuring a giant outdoor QR code. 

QR Codes — square bar codes containing data readable by smart phones and other electronic readers — have become an increasingly prevalent part of modern life  Although the general uses of these codes symbolize more our interaction with technology, Gollance hopes the interactive nature of her work will “encourage face-to-face social interaction.”

Gollance's piece is a working QR code which could be scanned from above. To see the QR's site, click here.

Shadowplay

Shadowplay is a video sculpture best seen at night by artist Matt Callahan. The piece explores “the influence that Washington University, as well as the larger city of St. Louis as a whole, has had in shaping University City.” 

His video joins computer-generated animation with scenes shot from inside . 

Shadowplay appears in the east-side shop windows of the Market in the Loop Plaza.

Sculpture Series

To see photos of the sculptures as they were being constructed, see the Commission on Arts & Letters web site. 

The sculpture project is funded by The City of University City, the Municipal Commission on Arts & Letters, the and the Marvin Levy Fund. 

Some past projects have become a permanent part of the city’s landscape, including “Rain Man” near the and “Rhythm Section” outside the Centennial Commons.