Travelling Light (AKA a blue circle)

[Minnie]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

There I was plowing a low priced German prostitute and the idea just popped into my head.

Originally Posted by First Lady

Christmas lights! That's what it needs.

The big blue circle, or the prostitute?

[Regular_John]

Originally Posted by Bunk

I agree - the majority of stuff that's been commissioned through this program is quite good.

I particularly like how the new art they installed at the gateway stations on 7th Ave look - they really fit in with the aesthetic of the whole transit mall corridor (which has turned out very nicely in my opinion). The space beside the new BVC and City Hall used to be horrific - now it's quite a nice, interesting urban space.

I don't have an actual photo yet, but this is the rendering for it:



This object will also be part of the new Barb Scott Park in Beltline, which has some potential



Also, these two locations are clearly ones where the art can be fully appreciated and has a lot of value.

Can you speak the procurement/selection process for pieces? I sort of gather that there's a panel of folks from the art/design community involved and I see that one can register as an artist for considerations. But I'm little fuzzy on how the process actually works.

Does the city/panel put out RFP's to registered artist/firms basically saying "We've got project [X] with an arts budget of [Y]"?

Or is it more of a specifically tailored "We'd like to place a [water feature/sculpture/decorative facade] on this project, what can we purchase"?

As posted before, I'm a fan of the public arts project in it's current form, but obviously many of us are scratching our heads over the new blue ring.

[GGG]

One thing I don't like about the 1% is that it seems like an afterthought. In needs to get integrated into the design early on and fit with whats around it.

I for one love the trout at the glenmore overpass and the mountains in other overpasses. The best part of the trout is that when the overpass floods once a year the trout is jumping out of actual water.

[4X4]

Originally Posted by ranchlandsselling

Holy crap would I be pissed if I lived in one of those houses.

La-tex con-do? I'd love to live in one of those.

[Oling_Roachinen]

Edit: And I missed Ktrain's post. Nevermind.

[worth]

Great article by the manufacturer, Heavy Industries:

Travelling Light - it isn’t easy being blue…
the skinny by heavy industries

I had a look back at inges idee’s proposal to the City to provide some insight into the concept and put together a synopsis.

inges idee examined the site conditions, noting the location for the artwork was where four bridge structures crossed physical features like Nose Creek, the regional pathway, and the railway line. They called the site

“a conglomerate of intersecting traffic flows moving at different speeds.”

The lights mounted on top “trigger associations with a bird or a bicycle rider”. The arches of the lamps call to mind handlebars of a high wheeler, or the silhouette of a bird, or a butterfly’s antennae – as such, they allude to slower speeds of travel and to the nearby airport simultaneously. The arches are positioned at a 90 degree angle to the ring, symbolizing the intersection of different paths.

So many people have commented on the simplicity of the artwork, asking how something that looks so simple cost this much money. In this video, Axel Lieber of inges idee discusses the concept behind the project (before anybody ever saw it) and notes:

“If it looks very simple at the very end, we did a good job, but nobody will know how complicated it was. [...] If it looks really easy and that it’s not a big deal, then it’s a success to us.”

http://heavyindustries.ca/travelling...sy-being-blue/

I'm not surprised this cost nearly half a mill. It's 20" OD steel pipe. That would not be cheap.

Edit: Just did a little math. I actually buy 20" Schedule 80 pipe for my work. No idea what wall thickness they would use but my last purchase cost for 1ft of 20" sch 80 pipe was $545 per foot. In the article it says it has a 56 ft diameter x Pi = 176ft of pipe needed = $95,920 in pipe alone.

[Jimmy Stang]

Originally Posted by GGG

One thing I don't like about the 1% is that it seems like an afterthought. In needs to get integrated into the design early on and fit with whats around it.

This sums it up for me. I like public art, and I like that our city is more interesting because of it. There are a plenty of good examples of where this policy has had some really good results. But this one just seems to be an unimaginative afterthought.

[SeeBass]

I am just grateful that it is not a lasso or a cowboy hat

[Hevishot]

The first time I drove past it I assumed that it was some sort of olympic rings art in the making and they were going to be adding the rest of the rings in the next few days/weeks and that was the first one they decided to put up. Guess I was really wrong. Somebody should lose their job for approving such a waste of money for something sanford and son could of built and painted with tremclad.

[Muta]

Maybe Bunk knows this - from what I know, the 1% art fee is always part of the original budget set out in the RFP. This isn't a hidden cost; correct?

[Resolute 14]

I have nothing against Heavy Industries here. As a fabrication project, it is well done. But guys, give it up. The ring doesn't conjure images of anything but wasted money. It is an eye sore that completely dominates the area in a bad way.

[para transit fellow]

Originally Posted by worth

Edit: Just did a little math. I actually buy 20" Schedule 80 pipe for my work. No idea what wall thickness they would use but my last purchase cost for 1ft of 20" sch 80 pipe was $545 per foot. In the article it says it has a 56 ft diameter x Pi = 176ft of pipe needed = $95,920 in pipe alone.

Can you give any suggestion about how much it might cost to curve the pipes and weld it

( I'm always curious about how much stuff costs)


I still think that from a distance, it looks like a giant hotwheels(tm) loop the loop track.....

[Regulator75]

First rule in government spending: Why build one when you can have two at twice the price? Only, this one can be kept secret...

I wonder where the secret one is?

Spoiler!

[calumniate]

I hope this becomes a huge scar on the resume of Inges Idee. Practically no good art is ever functional, and when you look at the portfolio of Inges Idee none of their other pieces are.

The notion that it 'triggers associations with a bird or bicycle rider' is ridiculous. No connotation with that kind of idea is possible because of its function.

I think it's funny that I'm criticizing something like this because I'm a fan of abstract and minimalist art. Had the work ended up an abstract bird on a giant bicycle, the results could have been pretty stellar. But at the end of the day this 'piece' of $%@# is just a lamp post in the form of a circle.

[_Q_]

Drove by this last night.... it's very weird.

[worth]

Originally Posted by para transit fellow

Can you give any suggestion about how much it might cost to curve the pipes and weld it

( I'm always curious about how much stuff costs)


I still think that from a distance, it looks like a giant hotwheels(tm) loop the loop track.....

To be honest I have no idea. I don't even know of a vendor who could bend 20" pipe like that. I typically buy 20" pipe in a 20ft length and then they are cut down to 4ft sections. I don't use more than 4ft at a time and the pipe is not bent.

If these guys bought 20ft lengths, they would need 9 lengths to complete the circle which would be a couple hundred hours of welding I would estimate.

I can't see the images at work so I can't tell if they were cutting the pipe and rewelding or if they were actually rolling long lengths of pipe. If they had to cut and weld the pipe all the way along, the hours would be sky high to do so.

[Temporary_User]

I almost wonder if this was setup by some ultra fiscal conservative in an effort to make people question the 1% art cost and government spending in general.
Some sort of "force me to spend $500,000 of taxpayers money on art, I'll show you how to waste it"

[You Need a Thneed]

Some of you are going really overboard in your hate for the thing. Sure, it could have been better, but I can easily see how putting this up costs $470,000. Like posted above, there is nearly $100,000 in raw pipe alone, never mind fabricating the thing, building a foundation for it, etc. The total amount spent is really arguable either, as it has to be the 1%. Sure, you can argue with the policy, but that's not related to this specific work.

The only criticism then is to argue about the quality of the artwork. Again, I don't particularly like the streetlights on top - "antennae"? Then why are they shaped exactly like the rest of the streetlights along the road? I don't have problems with a large ring, I don't think it's an eyesore, certainly.

It I designed it, I would have put it in the median between the lanes, taken off the streetlights, and maybe painted it red instead of blue. I would have installed lighting a little differently too.

Art is always going to subjective, and no one should feel bad for disliking a work. However, there's nothing offensive about this piece. So just sit back and be glad that we are free to talk about whether we like a 17 metre blue ring or not.

[Bring_Back_Shantz]

Originally Posted by worth

To be honest I have no idea. I don't even know of a vendor who could bend 20" pipe like that. I typically buy 20" pipe in a 20ft length and then they are cut down to 4ft sections. I don't use more than 4ft at a time and the pipe is not bent.

If these guys bought 20ft lengths, they would need 9 lengths to complete the circle which would be a couple hundred hours of welding I would estimate.

I can't see the images at work so I can't tell if they were cutting the pipe and rewelding or if they were actually rolling long lengths of pipe. If they had to cut and weld the pipe all the way along, the hours would be sky high to do so.

There are lots of shops in Calgary that can bend pipe that big. I know of at least one or two that will bend up to 36".
I'm sure they just got the longest continual bends the could and welded that together. It's not a complicate process, but it can be pretty pricey.

[surferguy]

http://calgary.kijiji.ca/c-buy-and-s...AdIdZ533656524

Ha Ha - found this on Kijiji this morning!