Ghost Fence by John Sundling

TEMPOart Kicks Off Summer Artist Series with
Ghost Fence by John Sundling

Ghost Fence, a temporary artwork by Portland’s John Sundling, will debut in the Franklin Street median at the corner of Congress and Franklin Streets as part of the First Friday Art Walk on June 3, 2017. It will be the first of three summer projects by Portland artists commissioned by TEMPOart Portland, the non-profit organization dedicated to energizing Portland’s public spaces through temporary art installations.

Sundling’s piece utilizes the visual language of surveying and construction, using flagging tape, simple wood poles and plastic sheeting to create a “ghost fence” that outlines the original boundaries of Lincoln Park.

In the late 1960’s, the City of Portland razed existing communities to create the Franklin Street Arterial and make the area more “functional” and “modern”. Sundling is interested in this lost physical and social space and wants to “create a simple and effective reminder of both past and present, as well as a place to envision the future.” “My goal is to create an awareness of the past and a place in the present to gather, share stories and create positive memories,” said Sundling.

Sundling’s June project will be followed on July 7th by Christina Bechstein’s Now We Plant: Seeds for our American Dream at the Boyd Street Urban Farm, and Christian Prasch’s Wall.., opening August 4th (pending City of Portland Permit) in Post Office Plaza. All three commemorate the one-year anniversary of TEMPOart’s inaugural project, Judith Hoffman’s, The American Dream, the Lincoln Park sculpture that will remain on view through the summer, and each new installation responds to that first sculpture by offering ways to understand the meaning of the “American Dream” today.

The Artist
John Sundling is an artist and designer, working in diverse disciplines including floristry, set design, sculpture, curation and custom fabrication. Recent work includes miniature sets for puppets in a feature film, and co-directing a “no-profit arts disorganization,” the Institute for American Art. His sculptural work has been primarily large-scale, often outdoors, with an emphasis on the effects of time and nature. The artist’s set design work has grown to become more environmental and sculptural in response to this exploration. Sundling is most interested in the blurry edges of his practices and how they inform each other.

TEMPOart Portland
TEMPOart energizes Portland’s public spaces through temporary art installations – engaging residents and visitors, enriching its creative community and enhancing Portland’s reputation as a world-class city. We provide opportunities for artists to experiment with new mediums, highlight current issues and engage a wide public audience. We partner with other on-profit educational and cultural institutions, using each project to inspire innovative learning opportunities for all ages. TEMPOart is a privately-funded 501-c3 non-profit organization and is administered by a Board of Directors.

#TEMPOartMaine #GhostFence

2018 Curator Announced!

TEMPOart Portland is pleased to announce Christina Lanzl as curator for its 2018 series of public art installations in the Back Cove, a one-mile tidal estuary basin on the northern side of the downtown district. TEMPOart received a strong group of applications from across New England for its 2018 season, which may feature sculptural installations, time-based/durational media and other temporary works that respond to and activate the site. Lanzl was selected because the combination of her experience, vision, network, and record of success set her apart.

Christina Lanzl is a nationally recognized public art curator with two decades of experience. She holds a PhD in art history with a concentration in public art from the University of Munich, and has overseen and curated over 100 public art and cultural planning initiatives in both the public and private sectors. Projects include Art on Hand for the Fort Point Arts Community in Boston, the South Main Mosaic Art Walk in Memphis, TN and curatorial consulting for the sculpture garden of the Knoxville Museum of Art. International endeavors include Kulturpark in Berlin, Germany, a visioning think tank and concurrent series of temporary interventions at an abandoned theme park, and public art for parks and the public realm of the new Shams district on Alreem Island of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates.

In addition to her work as a curator, public art adviser and cultural planner, Lanzl teaches placemaking and urbanism as well as history/theory in the Department of Architecture at Wentworth Institute of Technology. She is the co-founder of the Urban Culture Institute, the founding co-chair of the Placemaking Network of the Boston Society of Architects/AIA, and a board member of CultureNOW in New York.

Lanzl says that her “deep connection to waterfront cities and the experience of Portland’s rich cultural context, architecture, history, neighborhoods and public spaces available for site-specific installations,” motivated her to apply. TEMPOart Portland looks forward to collaborating with Lanzl in the coming months on the selection of artist/s and the development of the Back Cove project.

ANNOUNCING OUR SUMMER 2017 ARTISTS!

TEMPOart Portland is thrilled to announce the three artists who were selected for UNDER REVIEW: The American Dream. Artists were asked to respond to the relevance of the “American dream” in today’s socio-political climate, and to commemorate the one-year anniversary of TEMPOart’s inaugural project in Lincoln Park, Judith Hoffman’s The American Dream, which will remain on view through the summer.

Christina Bechstein, Christian Prasch, and John Sundling were selected based on their innovative project proposals by the TEMPOart board, and local arts professionals Stephen Benenson, Rachael Harkness, and Justin Levesque. The installations will launch at successive First Fridays in June, July and August (all projects are subject to approval by the City of Portland).

JUNE: JOHN SUNDLING
John Sundling will address the original boundary of Lincoln Park, as it was before the existing communities were razed to make way for Franklin Street. Sundling is interested in exploring these lost physical and social spaces via the visual language of temporary sculpture and ephemeral materials.

Sundling is an artist and designer, working in diverse disciplines including floristry, set design, sculpture, curation, and custom fabrication. His sculptural work has primarily been large-scale, often outdoors with an emphasis on the effects of time and nature on the pieces. Sundling is most interested in the blurry edges of his practices and how they inform each other.

JULY: CHRISTINA BECHSTEIN
Christina Bechstein will collaborate with gardeners, neighbors and friends from all over the world at the Boyd Street Community Garden and Cultivating Community. She will gather drawings, recipes, and growing patterns from diverse voices to create an aesthetic landscape to remind us of the importance of tending to our earth and our collective dreams.

Bechstein is an artist, mother and educator who has taught in art, design, and architecture programs across the United States. Her art practice is interdisciplinary and collaborative in nature, encompassing and overlapping such fields as social sculpture, large scale community-based public art, activism, sculpture, textiles, film and performance.

AUGUST: CHRISTIAN AARON PRASCH
Christian Aaron Prasch will install an interactive sculpture in Post Office Park that occupies the space as either a wall or a community gathering space. The artist will create an arena that spurs us to consider together how we should utilize our resources.

Prasch is a design professional in the Engineering and Infrastructure Group at the Portland Amec Foster Wheeler office. He has worked in Los Angeles with Michael Maltzan Architects, ProtoHomes, Design Hunter LA, and Kim Lewis Designs, and earned his Master’s degree from Columbia’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation. Prasch strives to instigate constructive interaction and community relationships through his design, and he treats play and experimentation as his most important tools for developing and realizing his work.

STAY TUNED FOR MORE DETAILS!!

CALLING MAINE ARTISTS!

CALL FOR ARTISTS

UNDER REVIEW: The American Dream

TEMPOart Portland invites Maine artists to submit proposals for temporary projects to activate Portland’s public spaces during Summer 2017. Up to three artists or artist teams will be awarded $1,000 each, and the submission deadline is February 28, 2017.

The full Call for Artists, including how to apply, can be found here:

TEMPOart 2017 Call to Artists

TEMPOart awarded $7,500 from the Morton-Kelley Charitable Trust

The grant from the Morton-Kelly Charitable Trust will go to support future education programming like last summer’s sculpture workshops at Oak Street Studios and Mayo Street Art.

 

TEMPOArt is pleased to be the latest recipient of a grant from the Morton-Kelly Charitable Trust, a foundation supporting conservation, preservation, culture, and education in Maine. Past grant recipients have included Children’s Museum & Theatre of Maine, Portland Museum of Art, Greater Portland Landmarks and Bowdoin College.
The grant will support administrative support and ongoing educational programming related to  Judith Hoffman’s The American Dream.

Thank you to the Morton-Kelley Charitable Trust!

Summer update for “The American Dream” reflects engagement with the community

The sun is shining, the birds are chirping and the smells of sunscreen and hot dogs are filling the air. All of this means summer and TEMPOart’s summer programming are in full swing.

Here is what we have accomplished so far:

From July 11th to July 15th, Oak Street Studios held their sculpture class as part of its summer camp programs for children. These kids visited the sculpture and made their own totem pieces inspired by Judith Hoffman’s “The American Dream.”

This month and into August, Mayo Street Arts will incorporate the sculpture as inspiration for their RAD! (Reading! Art! Dance!) summer program for children ages 7-11. RAD! improves literacy and encourages creativity through engaging, hands-on learning activities. Mayo Street Arts first visited the sculpture with their class on July 12th and Community Network Television was there to capture this visit and even snagged a few interviews with some of the budding artists. Watch the segment here.

On August 5th, from 5 – 8pm, both the students at Oak Street Studios and Mayo Street Arts will have their pieces exhibited at the park as part of a First Friday Extravaganza. For this, TEMPOart will also be partnering with Greater Portland Landmarks to offer an architectural scavenger hunt of the India Street Neighborhood.

“Rockland and Portland are leading a resurgence of 3D design.”

We are pleased to be included in Portland Press Herald’s review of outdoor sculpture in our state. Daniel Kany, Press Herald’s art critic featured our piece, an “exciting, jangly and teetering 12-foot pile of four single-family homes,” alongside the newly unveiled “Digital Man” by Johnathan Borofsky at the Center for Maine Contemporary Art in Rockland.

Both of these pieces and all their 3D glory are just the latest in the recent revival of public sculpture in the state. One just has to take a walk down Congress Street in Portland to see Charlie Hewitt’s 25-foot “Rattles,” Robert Indiana’s “7” or the bricks from the Portland Brick Project.

Read the full review here.

TEMPOart Receives Horizon Foundation Grant to Support Educational Programs Inspired by “The American Dream” Sculpture

The Horizon Foundation, based in Portland, Maine, has awarded TEMPOart a $10,000 grant to support public programming associated with “The American Dream” by sculptor Judith Hoffman. The 14-foot-tall steel and enamel sculpture representing typical American homes of different scales, stacked and inverted one on top of another, will be unveiled at 6:00 p.m. on June 3, 2016 as part of Portland’s First Friday Artwalk.

Horizon Foundation supports non-profit organizations that aspire to create and maintain sustainable, vibrant, and resilient communities by enabling children and adults to lead their communities in creative, healthy, and thoughtful ways.

The American Dream is the inaugural project of the privately-funded non-profit group TEMPOart, which selected Hoffman’s work because of its provocative questioning of what the idea of HOME means to our diverse community. The sculpture and TEMPO’s outreach programming are expected to stimulate reflection and dialogue about the fluid meaning of home within the context of the Portland community.

The Horizon grant will help fund TEMPOart’s plans to partner with other arts, education and cultural groups in Portland to reach a variety of audiences over the next twelve months. Collaborations will include:

  • Oak Street Studios’ “Side X Side” program will feature artists leading 160 third graders at East End and Reiche Elementary Schools who are studying Portland history in the fall of 2016. Field trips to see the sculpture will be a jumping off point for reflections about home and map-making that is part of the curriculum.
  • Mayo Street Arts will conduct a Sculpture Study Workshop at the Portland Public Library to connect 40 East Bayside children aged 7-11 with Judith Hoffman’s sculpture as part of its RAD (Reading, Art, Dance) program during June, July and August.
  • Greater Portland Landmarks will offer several walking tours, one aimed at youth that will explore the totemic nature of the sculpture through a hunt for unique architectural features along Congress Street, culminating in art-making projects at Oak Street Studios.

Countdown begins for “The American Dream” installation!

This just in: Judith Hoffman’s beautiful and fascinating sculpture is on its way to Portland. Here are a two photos of the disassembled, finished artwork before it was packed and loaded for shipment.

Mark your calendar to attend the unveiling in Lincoln Park on Friday, June 3rd, during the First Friday Art Walk.

“The American Dream” fabrication update!

TEMPOart has received some amazing progress photos from artist Judith Hoffman for the sculpture to be installed later this month in Lincoln Park—at the corner of Congress & Franklin Streets. Mark your calendars to attend the unveiling on Friday, June 3rd—and celebrate First Friday with us.