PUBLIC ART IS OF COURSE meant to be touched and interacted with , but the purpose goes even further for Gregoire . “ What the Collection does is expand the possibilities of that interaction because it also makes you look out and to pay attention to what ’ s around . The art is all about context , about stepping back or stepping in or experiencing it in a non‐art way , like you are just walking by and suddenly it adds to your awareness .”
Take Michael Asher ’ s Untitled — a relatively simple drinking fountain , it is in some ways invisible in campus ’ Town Square .
“ Michael Asher ’ s piece has this quietness and small scale ,” Gregoire says . “ It doesn ’ t assert itself . But the more you zoom in on it the bigger it becomes . And the questions it asks are big questions . It ’ s a drinking fountain , but once you pay attention to that you question what it is doing , you notice how it aims at the historic military flagpole and then the plaque on the rock that describes the history of Camp Matthews , so one thing leads to another and another . The more you look , the more you see . The more you pay attention , the more there is to pay attention to .”
“ It ’ s not a Trevi fountain ,” adds Beebe . “ It ’ s not a big civic fountain in that sense , but it ’ s a subtle fountain with limited water . In California water is scarce , so this is filtered , cool water in a measured dose . Asher ’ s Untitled is about all those subtleties .”
OTHER WORKS IN THE STUART COLLECTION are impossible to miss , such as Do Ho Suh ’ s Fallen Star , which sits on the rooftop of Jacobs Hall looking as if it was dropped there by the same twister that tossed Dorothy ’ s house into the Land of Oz . The installation is so unorthodox there was actually a time when the artist wondered if anyone would actually let him “ crash ” a house into a building .
“ We took a deep breath and said , ‘ Let ’ s go for it ,’” Beebe recalls . But while any viewer ’ s attention is naturally drawn to its seemingly precarious position on a rooftop , the work ’ s meaning only gets deeper as you enter the structure . It looks very much lived in , and is even furnished with personal items and photographs from people ’ s lives . By representing a true home , it brings to mind the idea of what “ home ” really is . This concept is important to Suh , having lived around the world , and the artist considered it a very appropriate subject for a university campus .
EARLY IDEAS ( above ) Do Ho Suh ’ s initial proposal for Fallen Star called for the house to crash into the side of a building , not land on its rooftop . An entirely different option involved an Asian garden grown on a flatbed truck — see that proposal at TRITONMAG . COM / STUART
( left ) Michael Asher ’ s
Untitled was designed to align with Town Square ’ s flagpole , as well as balance the square ’ s historical marker of Camp Matthews .
“ The art is all about context , about stepping back or stepping in or experiencing it in a non-art way , like you are just walking by and suddenly it adds to your awareness .”
Mathieu Gregoire
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