Yearly Archives: 2011

PUBLIC ART and LEED – Materials & Resources and Indoor Environmental Quality

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continued from… PUBLIC ART and LEED – Energy & Atmosphere

MATERIALS & RESOURCES

Recycled Content – should be self explanatory. Use post-industrial or post-consumer recycled materials

Regional Materials –means all materials used in a project are sources within 500 miles of project site

rendering of Erwin Timmers recycled glass artwork

Construction Waste Management – To earn a credit in Construction Waste Management the project must Divert construction waste from landfills towards recycling or reuse.

rendering of Didier Hess' Orit Haj

Example: The artist, Erwin Timmers, dug through the site demolition to remove glass for this 30 feet long by 9 feet high artwork. The recycled glass was then melted down and recast into the new colorful forms.

Example: Didier Hess’ Orit Haj will incorporate rammed earth from excavation of interpretive center, stainless steel rod, concrete and concrete fiberboard scraps from building construction.

Rapidly Renewable Materials – are natural materials that regenerate in less than 10 years, like bamboo, straw, cork, natural linoleum products (such as Marmoleum), wool, wheatboard, and strawboard.

Certified Wood – And you can use wood if it is a Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)-certified wood product.

INDOOR ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY

Low-Emitting materials – If artwork will be indoors the material must have Low or no VOC (volatile organic compound) content.

And projects should enhance the Daylight & Views

The conversation continues here: PUBLIC ART and LEED – Innovation & Design

 

Rebecca Ansert, founder of Green Public Art, is an art consultant who specializes in artist solicitation, artist selection, and public art project management for both private and public agencies. She is a graduate of the master’s degree program in Public Art Studies at the University of Southern California and has a unique interest in how art can demonstrate green processes or utilize green design theories and techniques in LEED certified buildings.

Green Public Art is a Los Angeles-based consultancy that was founded in 2009 in an effort to advance the conversation of public art’s role in green building. The consultancy specializes in public art project development and management, artist solicitation and selection, creative community involvement and knowledge of LEED building requirements. Green Public Art also works with emerging and mid-career studio artists to demystify the public art process. The consultancy acts as a resource for artists to receive one-on-one consultation before, during, and after applying for a public art project.
Go to Green Public Art

PUBLIC ART and LEED – Energy & Atmosphere

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continued from… PUBLIC ART and LEED – Sustainable Sites and Water Efficiency

ENERGY & ATMOSPHERE

Decker Yeadon

Refrigerant Management – is a great opportunity for glass curtains. Points will be awarded if the project does not increase and/or reduces a building heat load.

False Creek Energy Centre

Example: Architectural material technologists, Decker Yeadon, have developed a material that regulates a building’s climate by automatically responding to environmental conditions, without need of people, or energy intensive machinery. Watch the video to get a real sense of how revolutionary their Homeostatic Facade Systemcould be for building design.

On-site renewable energy – must always be used if artwork needs to be powered

Example: In Vancouver, at the False Creek Energy Centre, public art is activated by the operations of the facility, which produces domestic hot water and space heating for the adjacent community. At the top of each stack is a LED light fixture which changes color from blue – orange – red relative to the heat output of the plant.

piezoelectric walkway

Example: PIEZOELECTRIC WALKWAYS is a power technology which uses pressure generated by people walking to produce electricity. Toulouse, France is now using the technology to generate enough electricity to run streetlights.

Green Power – to earn credits in the Green Power category projects must use renewable energy and make it visible and traceable. By definition green power produces no manmade greenhouse gas emissions and can be solar, wind, geothermal, biogas, biomass and hydroelectric

Mags Harries & Lajos Heder's SunFlower: An Electric Garden

Example: Mags Harries & Lajos Hedder’s SunFlower, An Electric Garden is a public art project in Austin, Texas feeds about 15 KW of electricity into the grid for credit, which funds the maintenance and operating costs for the project.

The conversation continues here: PUBLIC ART and LEED – Materials & Resources and Indoor Environmental Quality

Rebecca Ansert, founder of Green Public Art, is an art consultant who specializes in artist solicitation, artist selection, and public art project management for both private and public agencies. She is a graduate of the master’s degree program in Public Art Studies at the University of Southern California and has a unique interest in how art can demonstrate green processes or utilize green design theories and techniques in LEED certified buildings.

Green Public Art is a Los Angeles-based consultancy that was founded in 2009 in an effort to advance the conversation of public art’s role in green building. The consultancy specializes in public art project development and management, artist solicitation and selection, creative community involvement and knowledge of LEED building requirements. Green Public Art also works with emerging and mid-career studio artists to demystify the public art process. The consultancy acts as a resource for artists to receive one-on-one consultation before, during, and after applying for a public art project.
Go to Green Public Art

PUBLIC ART and LEED – Sustainable Sites & Water Efficiency

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This post comes to you from Green Public Art

continued from the conversation… Green Building: Where Does The Art Fit In?

Within a standard new construction LEED checklist there are several entry points where I believe public art could have a contributing role to the final tally of certification points and the following should be viewed as place to START. I am sure there are many more possibilities.

SUSTAINABLE SITES

Gitta Gschwendtner's Animal Wall. Photo: Safle

Site Development – Points are available for restoring or protecting native habitats & maximizing or creating better open space

Example: Gitta Gschwendtner‘s Animal Wall is part of a 50 meter long wall, running along the edge of a new residential development. The approach taken for this artwork is to assist wildlife in the area and encourage further habitation. The Artist’s design for the ’Animal Wall’ matches the number of new homes with about 1,000 nest boxes made from custom woodcrete cladding for different bird and bat species, integrated into the fabric of the wall that separates the development from the adjacent public riverside walk.

Jackie Brookner's Urban Rain

Stormwater Design – Points are available if the project converts impervious surfaces to pervious surfaces to mitigate contribution of stormwater runoff

Example: Jackie Brookner’s, Urban Rain project aerates the stormwater runoff as it drops into the rock basin below, where it is detained and filtered before flowing into a bioswale.  The second component is a translucent rock filter that allows the infiltration processes that usually happen underground to be visible.

Heat Island effect – Points are achieved if the project reduces urban heat island effect on the roof or non-roof surfaces

Example: Molly Dillworth’s, Cool Water, Hot Island installation served as an artistic relief to the heat island effect, acting somewhat like a white roof, reflecting heat instead of absorbing it.

Light Pollution Reduction – Simple – The project must not contribute to light pollution

WATER EFFICIENCY

Water Efficient Landscaping – If you are going to build a project out of natural materials use Indigenous plants and Xeriscaping to mitigate water in landscaping to earn Water Efficient Landscaping points.

Innovative Wastewater Technologies –points are available for projects that Use non-toilet wastewater or run-off water in an innovative way.

The conversation continues here: PUBLIC ART and LEED – Energy & Atmosphere

Rebecca Ansert, founder of Green Public Art, is an art consultant who specializes in artist solicitation, artist selection, and public art project management for both private and public agencies. She is a graduate of the master’s degree program in Public Art Studies at the University of Southern California and has a unique interest in how art can demonstrate green processes or utilize green design theories and techniques in LEED certified buildings.

Green Public Art is a Los Angeles-based consultancy that was founded in 2009 in an effort to advance the conversation of public art’s role in green building. The consultancy specializes in public art project development and management, artist solicitation and selection, creative community involvement and knowledge of LEED building requirements. Green Public Art also works with emerging and mid-career studio artists to demystify the public art process. The consultancy acts as a resource for artists to receive one-on-one consultation before, during, and after applying for a public art project.
Go to Green Public Art

Common Cause | WWF Articles | WWF UK

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This post comes to you from EcoArtScotland

Ben Twist highlighted this document at the Steep Trail event this weekend.  Common Cause sets out,

“to explore the central importance of cultural values in underpinning concern about the issues upon which we each work.

Common Cause: The Case for Working with our Cultural Values makes the case that civil society organisations can find common cause in working to activate and strengthen a set of helpful ‘intrinsic’ values, while working to diminish the importance of unhelpful ‘extrinsic’ values. The report highlights some of the ways in which communications, campaigns, and even government policy, inevitably serve to activate and strengthen some values rather than others.”

ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.

It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology.
Go to EcoArtScotland

Lofoten Whale Festival

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Henningsvaer, Norway; August 1st – 6th, 2011

We all know about the beauty of the largest animal on Earth, but still the whale lives under constant existential fear. Often, human beings do not see how important parts of the ecosystem are being threatened because the used medium for environmental communication is not attractive enough.
The “Lofoten Whale Festival” combines important educational work with “artist and fun activities” such as sailing trips, film interactions, talks and presentation, but also concerts, discussion rounds and party.

The meeting of humans and whales wants to appeal to children such as grown ups and is also aiming at boosting the local tourist economy.

For more information, such as the program, the participants and general info, click here.

This post is also available in: French

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

Cultivation Field

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 Cultivation Field is a Postgrad exhibition and symposium at the University of Reading (thanks to RANE for circulating) deadline for abstracts 29 July – exhibition and symposium end September 2011.

The premise for this Symposium and accompanying Exhibition is that cultivation is leading to new art practices deserving of critical inquiry and articulation. Whether in the garden or allotment, the soup kitchen or the road, on wasteland or the tower block, or wherever there are cracks in the system, cultivation provokes questions about human being’s relation to and encounter with the earth and its growth systems and operations. The purpose of this Symposium and Exhibition is to encourage discursive exchange and productive encounter between art practitioners and researchers within the cultivation field.   more…

 

ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.

It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology.
Go to EcoArtScotland

Volunteers Take Center Stage In Trailer Restoration

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Sam and his cousin Sasuke make templates for plywood that will be used to cover the walls and ceiling.

With graduation over, work on the Trailer Trash restoration has heated up.  The 1951 Spartan Royal Mansion left it’s CalArts home on June 15 and was towed 10 miles to a canyon on the the outskirts of Santa Clarita, where lizards and coyote are almost as plentiful as motorcycles rushing to the Angeles National Forest.

In June, Sam’s cousin, Sasuke, came from Japan to help out.  A recent graduate in geology from Kyoto University,  he spent a month working with Sam inside the trailer.  (Sasuke has an interest in nuclear energy and hekept us posted on recent happenings at the Fukushima nuclear reactor.)

The task at hand was to the walls and ceiling.  First, Sasuke attached wooden strips to along the ribs where the cabinets and closets will eventually be installed. Then he fashioned carboard templates which will be used as a pattern for the plywood that will cover the walls. The job isn’t  as easy as it looks; it requires lots of measuring, precision and patience.  Although he had little building experience, it is hard to imagine how Sam would have gotten the job done without Sasuke’s help!

If you are considering volunteering your time with The Trailer Trash Project, this slideshow might show you the kind of work we’re involved with now: 

This post is part of a series documenting Sam Breen’a Spartan Restoration Project. Please see his first post here and check out the archive here. The CSPA is helping Sam by serving in an advisory role, offering modest support and featuring Sam’s Progress by syndicating his feed from http://spartantrailerrestoration.wordpress.com as part of our CSPA Supports Program.

New Metaphors for Sustainability from the Ashden Directory

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From the ‘iron curtain’ to the ‘glass ceiling’, metaphors are one of the most powerful ways in which we frame the way we think. Yet one of the key concepts in environmentalism – sustainability –  seems to be remarkably short of vivid metaphors.

So we asked some artists, writers, architects, cultural commentators, environmentalists, activists and scientists to come up with their own metaphors for sustainability.

Their suggestions are now appearing on our blog Ashdenizen

http://ashdenizen.blogspot.com/

and they are also collected together on the Ashden Directory

http://www.ashdendirectory.org.uk/featuresView.asp?pageIdentifier=2011414_37524050

along with a film of the first four people explaining their choice of metaphor.

http://www.ashdendirectory.org.uk/featuresView.asp?pageIdentifier=2011410_28527468

You can follow us on

http://twitter.com/ashdenizen

Creative environmental remediation

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ecoartscotland received the following email from Ilka Nelson in Australia,

I am now writing to … ask if you know of a project I could work on as part of my Masters research programme? I have attached a pdf which has the project requirements and a snapshot of my background/area of interest. I’m prepared to travel to the right place, am self funded and am very very interested to engage with a creative remediation project but would love to hear of any idea this email ignites

Loosely, my Masters study launches from the premise that a state of ecocide is already upon us and that our global environmental crisis is underpinned by cultural roots which can be understood in part, as a crisis of vision. The aim of the research is to apply ecological thinking to these crises to identify what tools facilitate culture-nature connection and where these tools activate new narratives/imaginings/visions for an ecologically responsive paradigm.

The Last Tree website (www.thelasttree.net) is a good reference for my work. If you have questions please email or call +61266803263 (I’m in Sydney timezone). From this Friday (1st July) I’ll be outback for the next 2 weeks without phone/email so please be patient for my reply. I aim to make all arrangements for this project late July as I’d like the placement to commence mid-late August.

The Masters forms part of the Remnant/Emergency Art Lab.

This is being posted in the hope that someone within the network will be interested in working with Ilka Nelson.  Please contact directly.

ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.

It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology.
Go to EcoArtScotland

Hot Times at the Silver Bullet

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With graduation over, work on the Trailer Trash restoration has heated up.  The 1951 Spartan Royal Mansion left it’s CalArts home on June 15 and was towed 10 miles to a canyon on the the outskirts of Santa Clarita, where lizards and coyote are almost as plentiful as motorcyclists roaring up the road to the Angeles National Forest.

Sam’s cousin, Sasuke Breen, came from Japan to help out.  A recent graduate in geology from Kyoto University,  he spent a month helping Sam get ready to install the walls and ceiling.  He crafted and installed wooden strips to reinforce the studs on the walls and ceiling.   Then he made cardboard templates for the walls and ceiling – not as easy as it looks. The job requires lots of measuring and patience.  It’s hard to imagine how the job would have gotten done would have gotten done without Sasuke’s help. 

This post is part of a series documenting Sam Breen’a Spartan Restoration Project. Please see his first post here and check out the archive here. The CSPA is helping Sam by serving in an advisory role, offering modest support and featuring Sam’s Progress by syndicating his feed from http://spartantrailerrestoration.wordpress.com as part of our CSPA Supports Program.