A distinction I’m currently exploring: works of scale that are either sited or distributed.

Scale is about both space and time, both system and structure, both people and place. It’s spatial, it’s quantifiable and it’s political. 

Works of scale exceed the hands, the frame, the gallery, the stage, the contained field. They create the field and they recreate the frame. Works of scale both respond to and create their public spaces. They offer artists enormous scope within complex constraints, and they offer audiences the compelling provocation to understand public spaces anew.

Importantly, both sited and distributed works of scale offer vital opportunities to stimulate advocacy for the arts. This is crucial to Australia’s future as we engage meaningfully with our environmental and economic challenges to develop inspiring, sustainable regional and urban places. 

Sited works – located installation; technology-driven public art; public sculpture; architecture; public performance; whole-of-town collaborations…
Distributed works – dispersed works; critical mass works; technologically-enabled artworks; works that hijack distribution systems; live art; works that distribute objects or gestures…

I’m keen to develop this distinction further. What types of sited or distributed works can you think of? Scroll for the response field. 

 

IMAGE: My curatorial project Philosophy as Public Art, presented in 2004 as a week of spatial exploration workshops in which philosophical problems were resolved into works of art. Sessions led by public artists Jason Maling, Phil Hall and Will Georgiev. Image shows Jason Maling’s Splint performed by workshop participants as a spatial exploration in Federation Square.