Batron Springs Pool Lights

Barton Springs Pool is nicknamed "The Soul of Austin". Unfortunately, thinking of landmarks synonymous with other cities conjures up colorful imagery, while Barton Springs is relatively bland. While the pool is perhaps the most interactive of many landmarks from many cities, it still misses a bit of flash. For example, the designs along the road approaching LAX are synonymous with Los Angeles. The designs consist of many glass columns filled with lights, which cycle through color combinations. In New York, the famous Empire State Building is lit up at night to correlate with festivities in the city. For example, the building will be red, white, and blue on Independence Day; all green on St. Patrick's Day; and will sport the colors of any local team in a playoff run. With the much needed renovations of Barton Springs going on right now, why not entertain the thought of adding underwater lights to the pool? The lights would increase the pools popularity, promote local festivals, make the pool safer to swim in at night, and would solidify the pool's place in Austin's culture.

by Richard Glass

Ryan's Bat Plan

I wanted to keep an austin theme so I chose the Congress Bridge for my Art proposal. To enhance the Austin experience for locals and visitors I'd like to paint bats alongside the congress bridge. A non-toxic paint would have to be used. The idea here is for a fun and iconic image for this beautiful spectacle.

I found this photo of the congress bridge on herronstock.com

The idea I would like to propose is to take a pinwheel, and make it giant. With big decorated and colorful wings, or patterns like origami paper. I want them to be a fun, playful and bright image against the back drop of Austin. I want them to contrast the normal colors of a city, so be visually odd in there environment from afar, like in a postcard of the city view. I want them to be odd and unexpected when people see them from afar but recognizable, because pinwheels are fun objects no matter when you see one. But where they are actually located is in some park (I'm initially thinking Zilker park but am visiting more areas today.) and parks are fun places too, and it could be the focal point of a children s play area or a picnic area. I want them to be enormous. At least to a point where they can be made functional. And you could either operate something local there or feed the energy into the grid, anything that really does something good.

Everlasting Souls

MY public art proposal is to have a large mural placed in the new library depicting the three St. Ed's professors who passed away earlier this year- Doctors Becker, McKemie, and Shirley. My plan is to have the project be a joint effort between students of the art school, who will paint it, and students of the respective schools in which each teacher worked. The art students will take the input of the teachers' former students and use them to show some of the characteristics and habits the teachers were known to have. An example of this is Dr. Shirley's oval glasses that most people remember him to have worn. The point of this work is to allow people to pay respect and remember these teachers, whether they knew them or not. I think it is important that their legacy lives on within our school and this would be a great way to aid in doing so.

The Auditorium Shores Wave

Melanie Morris

Lines are shown to represent the flow of water. 

I was inspired by two different things for my project: the skateboard park wave and the auditorium shores dog park. I wanted to create something to keep the dogs safe in the summer heat. I plan to create this structure out of copper and coat it so that it is safe for drinking water. The water will be collected from the river and go through a filter underground as well as a cooling system. This water will run up the inside of the piece and run out the top of the structure. This water will run down the front of the piece, collecting at the bottom where there will be a dog "dish". This water will be constantly running and recycled/filtered/cooled each time through. The pumps will collect more water from the lake as needed. The opposite side of the piece will also add some coverage for the dogs to get out of the hot sun. 

Coexisting Creatures

 

 For my public art proposal, I want to make sculptures out of willow branches that have been weaved together to create animal figures.  These willow sculptures will be placed in groupings along the trails of Boggy Creek greenbelt in East Austin.  Since animal exploitation is a universal problem that is often ignored, I chose to make animal sculptures, so when people take a moment to look at these figures, they will also think about animals.  The decision to use a natural material came from desire to preserve the beautiful natural scenery of the location.   I decided on 6 different animals that will be placed together in pairs along the trail.  The animals are an otter and a fox, a chicken and a deer, and a cat and a goat.  The odd groupings such as the otter and the fox are supposed to both remind people how we can all coexist together and to also catch the attention of people walking along the path.   Hopefully when people are enjoying the scenic area of the greenbelt, they will appreciate the sculptures as well as real animals.
- Alexa Ferguson

http://twistedhedge.blogspot.com/2011/12/latest-willow-sculptures.html

Aeolian Harps

Aeolian Harps are an instrument played by the wind. They are named after Aeolus, the greek god of the wind. Aeolian harps create a beautiful, some what haunting, ambient sound as the strings resonate with one another. I learned about Aeolian harps after taking an American Literature class. Aeolian Harps became a central point of discussion amongst authors in the 19th century after Henry David Thorea, in Walden, compares a thunderstorm to an Aeolian Harp. Herman Melville later wrote a poem "Aeolian Harp" which rejects Thoreau's Romanticist view on storms, and instead creates a scene of a ship wrecked to havoc by a storm. Whichever view you take, I would like to place some of these harps around St.Edward's campus in order to add to the beauty of the scenery.

-Dillon Schuh

Bird Nirvana

Bird Nirvana 

http://naturessolarlights.com/images/thumbs/21372R01_Koi_Solar_Spouting_Water_Fountain.jpg

I would like to propose a new public sculpture in Blunn Creek Preserve. This project would spruce up a small area of the preserve which would bring in many new visitors that normally would not come to Blunn Creek. I propose a small, shaded area be designated a picnic area featuring my sculpture. The concept of my sculpture is that it will be a water feature that is an abstract representation of the water cycle. large ceramic fountain, sculpture would also serve as a bird bath so that visitors could watch birds. And in effect the wildlife would become part of the piece. I originally wanted to use stainless steel for this piece, but the reflective metal would scare birds off. So I decided to go with ceramic with a blue glaze (pictured above) The pump would be solar powered, and the water would be filtered each time it cycles though the system, much like the natural water cycle.

Dylan Baggett

Think Lovely Thoughts

For my project, I wanted to use light as my source of material. I thought that light projection, preferably into the sky, would expand my audience to where everyone could see it no matter where they were standing. But I also didn’t want to overexpose my audience to where the viewers overlook the projection, so I limited the showing from 3 a.m. – 5 a.m. on the 10^th day of every month. I chose to project an outline of a man looking like he is flying in the sky. This could have many interpreted meanings suited for anyone's imagination. 

http://www.zipmap.net/Texas/Travis_County/Z_Downtown.htm

http://raleighskyline.com/images/08.28.08/august.28.08_raleighskyline.com_09.jpg

By: Shannon Carter

The Eyes Of Texans Are Upon You

"The Eyes of Texans Are Upon You"

For my public art proposal, I chose to work off of inspiration that I used to complete a past project. I am using the same basic concept as my previous project, titled "Peering Up", which shows a dark figure peering up from beneath a stairway. For this project, I will enhance that same idea, change the location, and alter the meaning. It is called "The Eyes of Texans Are Upon You", and it will be located on the steps of the Texas State Capitol Building. I will add more dark figures and give them eyes to show that they are actually observing their surroundings. Some figures will be placed so that when you walk towards the steps, you will see them. Some figures will be placed so that when you walk down the steps, you will see them looking back at you as well. The ambiguity of the figures is meant to represent the diversity in our society, and how all kinds of people, regardless of race, social class, gender, or orientation, have political opinions and observations.

This piece is meant to comment on the personality and roles of politicians, as well as how the public views them. The recent presidential election inspired me to think about the true nature of politicians in contrast to the public opinion and view of them. Though politicians try to relate to the public and establish themselves as just another citizen, they are a completely different breed of person with, in some cases, different agendas and intentions than the public. As well, the public observes their elected politicians with watchful eyes, because it is the public's opinion that the politicians represent and work for them. This piece does not intend to make a negative statement regarding politicians. Instead, it aims at illustrating the contract between the public and the politicians, as well as the skeptical and extremely critical eyes that the public has for its elected officials.

Bobby Garcia

Tree of Wonderland

Tree of Wonderland is a piece made to create a place for people to escape. This place of escape is a life-size, abstract tree with the roots coming out of the land. The tree will be made of a blue-green fiberglass material (shown in the Luis Jimenez blue horse piece above) that resembles the magic of an imaginary world, like that of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. This idea arose from my fascination with images of a single tree standing alone in a big strip of land. A solitary tree has the power to draw you in, it becomes a kind of safe haven that signifies life and gives off the feeling of home. As far as the style of this abstract tree, I took inspiration from an image of a piece by Kevin Iris, called Wire Tree. This tree is a Japanese bonsai style tree made out of wires. The Iris piece shows a big canopy that forms a protective barrier, this canopy  brings the audience into the world that the tree creates. The placement of the Tree of Wonderland could be any wide open strip of land that is safe for people to travel on. I particularly chose a park called Dick Nicholas Park in Austin. Parks already call people to them, the addition of my piece would be a way to add a new element to a preexisting space.

-Pamela Nunez

Castle Hill Steps

Inspiration: I was inspired to come up with the idea of this public art proposal because of the fact that i enjoy spending time at castle hill and would like to see the weeds cleared away on this plot of land and replaced with something more aesthetically appealing that can also function as a space for people to sit and relax/socialize while enjoying a nice view of Austin. I was also inspired by Maya Lin's work which led  me to come up with this very simplistic design.

Audience: The audience for this piece is the many graffiti artists and graffiti admirers that visit this site daily.

Location: Castle hill is located at 1100 Baylor st. right next to the corner of Baylor and 10th.

Materials: The only materials needed for this project are concrete for the steps and metal for the letters.

Plan: My plan is to clear this overgrown plot of land and use its slant to incorporate a set of steps that will display a quote by the famous graffiti artist Banksy. The steps however will not take up the entire width of the land and on either side of it more wall space will  be created for artists to use.

“Imagine a city where graffiti wasn't illegal, a city where everybody could draw whatever they liked. Where every street was awash with a million colours and little phrases. Where standing at a bus stop was never boring. A city that felt like a party where everyone was invited...Imagine a city like that and stop leaning against the wall - it's wet.” -Banksy

-Annie Fuentes

Hidden Beauty

My idea is taking yarn-bombing to a new level. Instead of just knitting a nice looking pattern on to tree I though of knitting paintings. I got this idea from a blog I read where the lady does just that. (http://knitspot.com/?p=1961) I thought though that you could take lesser known paintings from well known artist and use those. That way not only are the people getting a beautiful site to see, but they are also getting educated in art history. I would want this to be located here on St.Edwards because unlike UT's campus we really don't have that much public art going on, and I think it would really enrich the campus if we had some. But I did put it kind of hidden, between Doyle and Fleck halls because I think that the environment around a piece has to do with how you view it, and this is a place with relativity low traffic allowing the viewer to get a silent view of these paintings.

Bold Austin, Tx

Idea, Inspiration, & Audience
Bold Austin was inspired by the famous L.A.X. lettering located in the Los Angeles International Airport. I wanted to try creating something on the big scale that could represent Texas' size. After I looked at the images of the L.A.X letters, I immediately knew that bold letters was the perfect idea for my proposal. The question was, what would the bold letters spell? Ever since I landed in Austin, I have learned to grow my love and respect for the Austin community. So I wanted it to be relevant to our city spirit and state size. I concluded to have my art spell ATX for Austin, Texas. Therefore, my intended audience is every Texan and tourist.

Location

I would love the letters to be placed "floating" on the Lady Bird Lake so that it can contribute to the Austin skyline. Specifically, the letters would be located on the left side of the S. Congress Ave. bridge. They would be centered on the lake so that the letters will be visible from the bridge. This way, once you are passing the bridge to enter downtown, you would see large scale bold letters ATX.

Materials
As far as materials, I would love to have each letter be surrounded by crushed aluminum cans to bring environmental awareness. Somehow, I could paste the cans in a way that the weather won't destroy it. Since every aluminum can will be a different color, the entire letter will be colorful. The colors could signify the cultural diversity of Austin, Tx.

BY: Cindy Castillo