City Issues Public Art Planning Document

The Pittsburgh Office of Public Art has published a new document titled, “Add Value Add Art” The document billed as a, “public art resource guide for developers,” was produced at the request of Urban Redevelopment Authority which wanted to help promote public art in new developments around town. Office of Public Art Director Renee Piechocki says the document deals with ways to get in touch with an artist and how to integrate art into a development. She says the most basic way to add art is to simply purchase a work to be mounted inside or outside of a new building. From there Piechocki says the document talks about way art can be made part of the structure of the building or can be used in place of off-the-shelf” items such as benches or fences. “When a designer comes up with a list of items there is always a bench and there is a line item for what those are going to cost, and what this document is about is saying you know you are going to spend $1,000 a bench instead of buying it from a catalog where anyone in the country can have it, why not commission a local artist to make the same bench to the same specs and for the same costs,” says Piechocki. The document will also include photographs and descriptions of different types of public art projects.
Piechocki says,” This guide is the first step in giving developers in Pittsburgh the tools they need to work with artists on their projects.” The document can be found at the URA web site.
A list of local artists can be found here.