Reading Response: Miwon Kwon, Ch. 3

Kwon did a particularly nice job of addressing the fact that the history and implications of the term “site specificity” can be inconsistent from context to context and of charting the “particular trajectory of site specificity within public art as a point of clarification.”  Kwon’s descriptions and examples of the three paradigms (art-in-public-places, art-as-public-places, and art-in-the-public-interest) were easy to follow and understand.

One thing I thought was interesting was that Kwon referred to Tilted Arc and Ahearn’s South Bronx sculpture as two “failed” public art works.  I’m not sure that failed is the best word.  Yes, both works were taken down soon after installation due to the controversy surrounding them, but both works created a huge amount of conversation and challenged the art-as-public-spaces paradigm.  Rather than failures, I believe these works are successes because, in my opinion, an important part of public art should be to generate questions, expose invisible issues, and perform a “proactive interrogation.”

Kwon’s discussion about the past desire of many artists and public art agencies to reconcile the division between art and utility reminded me of a discussion I had earlier this week.  In one of my marketing classes, someone asked if there could be design without utility.  Due to my many art and design classes, I quickly answered that the purpose of design is to provide solutions to problems, so utility is inherent to design.  I continued that art, on the other hand, does not have to be utilitarian.  I was so confident in my answer, so when I read about this idea of prioritizing public art’s use value over its aesthetic value I was perplexed.  If art had to be useful then where was the distinction between art and design?  I loved Serra’s quote: “I an interested in sculpture which is non-utilitarian, non-functional… any use is a misuse.”