Overview

What is an appropriate monument for the current city of Philadelphia? That was the question posed by the curators, artists, scholars, and students who comprise the Philadelphia-based public art and history studio Monument Lab. And in 2017, along with Mural Arts Philadelphia, they produced and organized a groundbreaking, city-wide exhibition of temporary, site-specific works that engaged directly with the community. The installations, by a cohort of diverse artists considering issues of identity, appeared in iconic public squares and neighborhood parks with research and learning labs and prototype monuments.  Monument Lab is a fabulous compendium of the exhibition and a critical reflection of the proceedings, including contributions from interlocutors and collaborators. The exhibition and this handbook were designed to generate new ways of thinking about monuments and public art as well as to find new, critical perspectives to reflect on the monuments we have inherited and to imagine those we have yet to build. Monument Lab energizes acivic dialogue about place and history as forces for a deeper questioning of what it means to be Philadelphian in a time of renewal and continuing struggle. Contributors: Alexander Alberro, Alliyah Allen, Laurie Allen, Andrew Friedman, Justin Geller, Kristen Giannantonio, Jane Golden, Aviva Kapust, Fariah Khan, Homay King, Stephanie Mach, Trapeta B. Mayson, Nathaniel Popkin, Ursula Rucker, Jodi Throckmorton, Salamishah Tillet, Jennifer Harford Vargas, Naomi Waltham-Smith, Bethany Wiggin, Mariam I. Williams, Leslie Willis-Lowry,  and the editors. Artists: Tania Bruguera, Mel Chin, Kara Crombie, Tyree Guyton, Hans Haacke, David Hartt, Sharon Hayes, King Britt and Joshua Mays, Klip Collective, Duane Linklater, Emeka Ogboh, Karyn Olivier, Michelle Angela Ortiz, Kaitlin Pomerantz, RAIR, Alexander Rosenberg, Jamel Shabazz, Hank Willis Thomas, Shira Walinsky and Southeast by Southeast, and Marisa Williamson.

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9781439916063

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Reviews

Monument Lab has taken the current controversies of public art and the future place of monuments and creatively engaged the public in serious and often playful ways. Using the city of Philadelphia with its prominent history and diversity as its inspiring springboard, each project described soars with meaning and conviction. Monument Lab leads the nation in working to achieve cities where public art is embraced by all their occupants and this book reflects their many unique stories. -Elizabeth Goldstein, President, The Municipal Art Society of New York Public art has a long and distinguished history in Philadelphia. Monument Lab was established not only to bring that history up to the present but also to interrogate the very notion of what constitutes art in the public realm. Monument Labis a testimony to the success of the endeavor, a record of the works and conversations related to the project, and a brilliant contribution to the wide conversation about the urgent topics related to the production and display of art outside the walls of a museum. -Carlos Basualdo, The Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Senior Curator of Contemporary Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art

Monument Lab has taken the current controversies of public art and the future place of monuments and creatively engaged the public in serious and often playful ways. Using the city of Philadelphia with its prominent history and diversity as its inspiring springboard, each project described soars with meaning and conviction. Monument Lab leads the nation in working to achieve cities where public art is embraced by all their occupants and this book reflects their many unique stories. -Elizabeth Goldstein, President, The Municipal Art Society of New York Public art has a long and distinguished history in Philadelphia. Monument Lab was established not only to bring that history up to the present but also to interrogate the very notion of what constitutes art in the public realm. Monument Labis a testimony to the success of the endeavor, a record of the works and conversations related to the project, and a brilliant contribution to the wide conversation about the urgent topics related to the production and display of art outside the walls of a museum. -Carlos Basualdo, The Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Senior Curator of Contemporary Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art

Public art has a long and distinguished history in Philadelphia. Monument Lab was established not only to bring that history up to the present but also to interrogate the very notion of what constitutes art in the public realm. Monument Labis a testimony to the success of the endeavor, a record of the works and conversations related to the project, and a brilliant contribution to the wide conversation about the urgent topics related to the production and display of art outside the walls of a museum. -Carlos Basualdo, The Keith L. and Katherine Sachs Senior Curator of Contemporary Art at the Philadelphia Museum of Art Monument Lab has taken the current controversies of public art and the future place of monuments and creatively engaged the public in serious and often playful ways. Using the city of Philadelphia with its prominent history and diversity as its inspiring springboard, each project described soars with meaning and conviction. Monument Lab leads the nation in working to achieve cities where public art is embraced by all their occupants and this book reflects their many unique stories. -Elizabeth Goldstein, President, The Municipal Art Society of New York

Author Information

"Paul M. Farber is the Artistic Director of Monument Lab and Lecturer in Fine Arts and Urban Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. He is the author of ""A Wall of Our Own"": An American History of the Berlin Wall.   Ken Lum is the Chief Curatorial Advisor of Monument Lab and an Artist and Professor and Chair of the Department of Fine Arts at the University of Pennsylvania.  He is co-author of Shanghai Modern: 1919 - 1945."

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