Established Midwest Artist to Create New Large-Scale Work for New East Norman Library

As part of the Norman Forward 1% for Art program, the Norman Arts Council is pleased to announce the selection of artist James Johnson to create a large-scale public sculpture for installation at the Norman Public Library East Branch. Located at 3001 E. Alameda Street, the library is currently under construction.

The new Norman Public Library East Branch will have a collection of 20,000+ items and will feature 12,500 square feet of highly flexible space that will support a mobile service approach, new education models, collaborative learning, information sharing and digital literacy.

The 1% for Art project team encouraged artwork that would complement the beauty of the site and the architecture of the building, expressing a spirit of wonderment, curiosity and learning inherent to all libraries. Johnson’s proposed sculpture hit all those marks, taking cues from the natural environment of the site and the building itself.

Though not seen in the photos of the artist’s model, the final sculpture will be made of Corten steel, the same material being utilized on the façade of the Library building. The artwork will be 14 feet tall and weigh approximately 3,000 pounds, making it clearly visible to street traffic and visitors alike. The sculpture will also be positioned so that during the Solstice, the sun will shine through the sculpture and onto the building.

Johnson is well-versed in creating large scale public art works, having completed numerous works currently on permanent and temporary exhibition in Kansas, Illinois, Arkansas, Indiana, Missouri and Iowa. He is inspired by ancient cultures, especially that of the Mayan and Inca, as a means to communicate lifestyle and culture. With a career spanning over 40 years, the sculptor has taught in colleges across the Midwest when not working on his own craft.

“As a sculptor, I have always been concerned with creating works of art that cause the viewer to pause and reflect upon their surrounding and, in doing so, become more aware of the environment that they are passing through,” Johnson said. “Equally important has been my use of the arch as a means of transforming the viewer from a place and time of activity to one of calm and reflection.”

The $30,000 project sought artists through an open call for requests for qualifications this past fall, attracting 125 applicants from across the country and world. A selection panel composed of a City of Norman designee, Public Arts Board member, Norman Arts Council board member, Ad Hoc Committee member, the designer/architect of the complex, a stakeholder in the project, arts expert and at large community members deliberated over artist qualifications.

The panel selected three finalists — hailing from Illinois, New Mexico and Norman, OK — who each created tailored design proposals inspired by the plans for the complex, as well as the history and culture of Norman. Johnson’s was selected from the three proposals, and the plans are for the sculpture to be complete and dedicated with the library’s targeted mid-May 2018 opening date.

On April 12, 2016, the City of Norman contracted with the Norman Arts Council to administer the 1% for Art program designated for Norman Forward projects. Norman Arts Council’s administrative role includes project development, refining a selection process (including the assembly of balanced selection panels), executing and installing the selected works through coordination between the City and artists and public engagement and education. Debby Williams, who served in similar capacity as director of the Oklahoma Art in Public Places Division for nearly a decade, was selected to manage the 1% for Art program.

James Johnson’s work is the one of many public art projects that will populate Norman through the Norman Forward 1% for Art program. Mark Aeling’s SPLASH will be ready to install upon completion of the Westwood Family Aquatic Center later this year. A new request for qualifications for the proposed new Central Branch of the Norman Public Library will be announced in the coming months. 

One of James Johnson's past projects.

Cultural Connections: Norman In Clermont-Ferrand Curatorial Statement

CULTURAL CONNECTIONS: NORMAN IN CLERMONT-FERRAND 
TEXTURES.  

In the United States, when 9/11 happened, everything changed…Everyone says that…It has become cliché…But everything changed. It just did. And for us – France and the US – partners through two Revolutions and two World Wars – everything changed. We were strained and stressed and a relationship that was forged over nearly 250 years was threatened by fear.

Then came Charlie Hebdo, then November 2015 in Paris, and 2016 Bastille Day in Nice. Terrorism has shaken us both and we are, as we started, once again commrades in freedom and democracy. We need each other, as we always have.

And that brings us to this:  Norman, Oklahoma in Clermont-Ferrand, France – “jumelage” – we are twinned – we are sisters, united by our commonalities and treasured for our differences.

With Cultural Connections, the Norman Arts Council works to build relationships, learning, and understanding through the exchange of ideas, culture, art, and people. We are diplomats and we are ensuring that the special relationship between our two towns and two countries (and with our sister cities around the world) continues to forge us into a global community.

In this exhibit, Cultural Connections: Norman in Clermont-Ferrand, you see the works of three Norman, Oklahoma artists. Jason Cytacki, Ginna Dowling, and Daren Kendall were chosen from many submitted proposals by a joint selection panel of representatives of each community. In September of this year, three Clermont-Ferrand artists: Hervé Brehiér, Cecile Gambini, and Annemarie Rognon will travel to Norman to complete the exchange.

We arrived in France to seek out something familiar, something to which we can all relate. Each artist, with their individual perspectives, has created site-specific installations that speak to their observations of this initially unfamiliar place. As they have worked, a fog began to lift, and we see that we are, in the end, not at all that different…

There was the waiter at breakfast – so excited to learn we were from the US that he proclaimed he would return home with us when his shift ended.

There was Christoff, who, one late night at a local bar, imprinted on us (well, on Jason, specifically). He had returned from California that morning and was longing for more connections from his sister country across the Atlantic.

There was the French election, which was eerily reflective of the recent US Election. We watched from the living room of one of our Clermontoise friends.

There was the familiar crowd at a sporting event that gripped the nation. Life comes to a blissful halt as strangers gather to drink beer out of plastic cups and hug one another when the home team goals and lament when they, once again, fail to achieve the long-fought-for victory.

Each of the three installations in Cultural Connections examines the textures of this place (Clermont-Ferrand) and this space (Chapelle de l’Oratoire). We are exploring the Physical, Social and Elemental textures of Clermont-Ferrand. We hope you enjoy our views of your place and we thank you for having us as your guests.

Erinn Gavaghan
Curator and
Executive Director, Norman Arts Council

Cultural Connections: Norman in Clermont-Ferrand Featured Artist Daren Kendall

Cultural Connections: Norman in Clermont-Ferrand, France debuts on Friday, May 19 as a part of Les Arts En Balade, helping us further the bonds between us and our sister city through culture and art. Here’s a preview of Daren Kendall’s work that will be showcased as part of the exhibition. 

Daren Kendall
Jai Pris les Armes Pour la Liberté de Tous (I Took up Arms For the Freedom of All) 

Concrete, steel, wood, glass, vulcanized rubber, Volvic lava stone and mineral water, piano wire,  amplifiers, contact microphones, photographs, and plastic.

Texture – Elemental

Daren Kendall’s work in the Chapelle de l’Oratoire gives form to the underlying ideas and beliefs that are central to our understanding of liberty and freedom in both France and the US. Inspired by the Vercingetorix statue at the center of Clermont-Ferrand, he initially found an interesting correlation in the gesture of the Gallic warrior and that of the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor, both created by Auguste Bartholdi. These monumental figures symbolize the quest for liberty and freedom in both France and the US, each posed with one arm extended to declare foundational virtues of individual freedom and independence. This led to further consider the connection between Clermont-Ferrand and Norman as sister cities. The figure of “the seed sower” at the University of Oklahoma is centrally located on campus and garnered as an icon of institutional identity. Created by local sculptor Paul Moore, the bronze figure is symbolic of another kind of liberty, specific to American expansion and manifest destiny. Both the allegorical sower and the historical warrior are reflective of the social function of public sculpture as an expression of cultural identity. Kendall’s work draws from the two monuments to explore their relationship to one another and envisions a sentient machine for the production of liberty and freedom.

The warrior and the seed sower extend their arms in two different directions, one toward the sky above and the other toward the earth below. Each figure is crafted in a frozen forward motion, one to plant life into the ground the other to conquer and overcome foe. In dialogue with each other a kind of corporeal dialectic begins to emerge. Two bodies in gestural opposition, in physical contrast, seem to pursue a similar goal, a utopic ending. They each embody the beliefs of freedom and expansion, beliefs elemental to their identity and to survive. These solitary figures are romantic ideals. Self-determined, they work independently without notions of collaboration and community.

“I am interested in the two figures as a means to question the ideological underpinnings that celebrate the heroic archetypes in the Western canon of sculpture,” said Kendall.  “I like the idea of the warrior and the seed sower in conversation, or perhaps working together to reach a common goal. I created an instrument, a sculpture, and a stage, to articulate this idea. The Chapelle de l’Oratoire has become the site to envision a new mythology.”

Two black vertical forms signify two sentient bodies. Eye-shaped slits run vertically up each column and reveal scenes of Clermont-Ferrand as a documentation of the artist’s personal memory. At the base of the column sound is transmitted through a concealed opening. In effect, a closed mouth to transmit the sound of humming. A single piano wire tethers each of the forms to the wall of the site, offering a context and the necessary tension to resonate with sound. Each figure is wrapped in a tight black plastic skin. Bound as if to protect the body from heightened sensation. At the core of each body an image of a human figure is revealed through a hole, one pointing up, the other pointing down toward the ground. Each column mimics the gesture with a length of steel rebar above. On the floor two horizontal concrete columns lead toward a central point. Each foundation is lined with strips of salvaged rubber like tires along a road. These are remnants of a vehicle, a system, and a desire to explore and conquer new territory, by car. A tube of steel conduit rides above the concrete and tires. One end attached to a piano wire, each with it’s own actuator, and at the other end a microphone. Vibration is transported from one end to the other like an electrical circuit or pipeline for transmission. At the center of it all a pile of volvic stone holds a glass of water – half-empty, half-full. Together, the system creates an instrument to activate the two bodies, as well as a site for visitors to move through and create their own sounds.

The result of the instrumental bodies, is that these fabricated beings have a life of their own. Occasionally, when it is very quiet in the Chapelle, one of them will softly begin to hum. Perhaps from some vibration in the earth, undetected by humans? Or maybe a fly brushed by a wire? Whatever the cause, the being serves to remind us of how uncontrolled technology can be. We can create it, but we cannot always control it. While the assistance of technology can offer a freedom to humans, it can also be our doom. This idea is related in the half full/half empty wine glass at the core of the installation.

Through this installation, Kendall has explored the 4 textural elements that make up the identity of Clermont-Ferrand and represent the four elements of the world: The local Volvic Water (water), Volvic Formations (fire), the tire industry (Earth), and Vibrations (wind).

The artist invites the viewer to experiment with the machine. Vibrations will cause differing hums to emanate. A gentle tap on the piano wire or the rebar arms, a light drumming on the vertical columns. 

Cultural Connections: Norman in Clermont-Ferrand Featured Artist Jason Cytacki

Cultural Connections: Norman in Clermont-Ferrand, France debuts on Friday, May 19 as a part of Les Arts En Balade, helping us further the bonds between us and our sister city through culture and art. Here’s a preview of Jason Cytacki’s work that will be showcased as part of the exhibition. 

Jason Cytacki
As yet untitled 

Graphite and ink on drafting film

Texture : Physical

Jason Cytacki’s work directly communicates with the space and directly represents the place. His graphite and ink drawing on semi-transparent drafting films overlay not only each other, but the raw walls of the space giving an illusion that these images are emerging from the walls of the Chapelle, thus allowing the physical texture of both place (Clermont-Ferrand) and space (Chapelle de l’Oratoire) to inform his work.

Cytacki is dissecting Clermont-Ferrand. As an “outsider” visiting this place, he found himself drawn more naturally to the exteriors of the city. Decorative elements over windows and doors, sewer pipes, cobblestones, these details are his personal reflections of the cultural identity of this place.

The Clermont-Ferrand drawings while like in style, contrast in subject with the work he brought with him from Norman. The Norman details from “home” are interior spaces, details of wood moldings, fabric window coverings, and upholstered furniture. They are images that exude homey-ness and comfort.

The similarities between the images of Clermont-Ferrand and Norman are that this installation reflects the literal background of what identifies each place. The subject of each drawing, in reality, likely fades into the background of everyday life.  However, here, in the Chapelle, they are given center stage. The result is a serene and delicate reminder of the cultural identity of our places. While our communities were formed hundreds of years apart and architectural and design details are diverse, side-by-side, in this installation, we are together nostalgic when looking at the textures that define “home.”

Cytacki’s artistic practice was challenged in a rewarding way here in Clermont-Ferrand. His regular process involves a controlled manner of working through sketches and design and ultimately creating a weel-crafted plan for a project. He finds his work more improvisational here, having to make decisions and adapting through the process. The challenges of hanging work on a wall that could not be directly attached to has forced a creative problem solving aspect of his work that has been highly satisfying to the overall experience of working in Clermont-Ferrand. What started as problem, ended up being one of Cytacki’s favorite aspects of the installation and pushed the project into a more interesting direction.

Cultural Connections: Norman in Clermont-Ferrand Featured Artist Ginna Dowling

Cultural Connections: Norman in Clermont-Ferrand, France debuts on Friday, May 19 as a part of Les Arts En Balade, helping us further the bonds between us and our sister city through culture and art. Here’s a preview of Ginna Dowling’s work that will be showcased as part of the exhibition. 

Ginna Dowling
A Tale of Two Sisters – Jumelage 

Vinyl prints, collage, newspapers, magazines, maps, brochures, memorabilia, construction paper, pins, and Post-It Notes

Texture : Social

This is a site-specific, story-telling installation. The work you see here began in Norman during Dowling’s exhibit at MAINSITE Contemporary Art: Home of the Norman Arts Council this past winter. For that exhibit, members of the community were invited to tear shapes and symbols that represented what their community means to them. Those participatory exercises are re-installed here in Clermont-Ferrand in the color transparencies and the two Norman boards.

Dowling uses this process of participatory story-telling as a way to highlight and strengthen individual, philosophical, communal, societal, and cultural connections. Through this practice, a universal language is created – much in an ancient, pictograph style.

This is not the first time Dowling has use the concepts of “sisters” in her work. The white images of sisters were some of the earliest work upon which she applied her printmaking-with-vinyl technique. She has been waiting for the right moment to include these images of young sisters (loosely based on herself and her own sister) in an installation. They now serve as the visual representation of sisterhood and the relationship between our two communities.

Much of Dowling’s work has a distinctly political under-tone to it.  This comes out naturally by inviting community participation – the contemporary issues of community are often some of the first ideas that people want to express. It can be cathartic to share in a communal process that allows individuals the freedom to express satisfaction or distaste for current affairs. Dowling gives a community permission to do that. The viewer will see echoes of politics-induced-stress in the works reinstalled from Norman. Initially, Dowling was hesitant to “be political” (as she put it) with her installation in this place. However, upon arrival, it was very clear that people wanted to talk about what was happening, and it was a major part of the current identity and must be included.

Dowling’s work was most challenged by the space (Chapelle de l’Oratoire). We went through several sketches of how to install her work, and had to redesign several times as we encountered the physical limits the height and age of the building presented. In the end, her work has become more organic to the site and has evolved to fit.  Her strong, black and white graphics of each community serve as visual pillars to her installation, drawing the viewer/participant into the comparisons of our sister cities. As this installation is interactive here in Clermont-Ferrand, as it was in Norman, the people who visit will leave torn symbols and short phrases that describe the place (Clermont-Ferrand). Through this process,  Dowling is gathering data to complete her study of the cultural identity of this place and twin it with that of Norman.