City Council Rejects Recommendation For Convention Center Artwork

In a public debate Monday, the City Council voted to reject the recommendation of the Pasadena Arts & Culture Commission to install works it hacapd solicited and approved by internationally-known sculptors Hans Peter Kuhn and Dennis Oppenheim at the new Pasadena Center plaza. They will instead, accept a recommendation by City Manager Michael Beck to seek alternatives.

The decision followed impassioned public comment from both sides of the debate; the discussion encompassed specific points of contention such as sight lines and structural issues, and wider contexts of policy, finances, aesthetics, heritage, even the purpose of art itself.

The two pieces of artwork in question are:

Lightfield by artist Hans Peter Kuhn, an abstract light sculpture installation to be located on the public plaza adjacent to the east Conference Center pavilion. “Lightfield” is composed of 25 illuminated polycarbonate tubes that rise approximately 5 feet from the base. The field of light will swivel and be randomly repositioned by an automatic mechanism, a two-axis swiveling base programmed to allow each tube to move and rotate in a conic fashion. The tubes may also be programmed to disengage, allowing them to sway in the wind. The base is concrete with granite-clad sides and top, 15’x38’ in plan and 20” high.

Thinking Caps by artist Dennis Oppenheim, a sculptural piece in architectural scale forming an enclosure of projection surfaces which conveys the notion that it creates and holds ideas, thereby reflecting the many activities, conferences, functions, and meetings that take place within the Pasadena Center. Sited on the west end of the Plaza, adjacent to the Ballroom, the sculpture is 15’h x 30’d and consists of three hats: train hat, sun hat and conductor’s cap. They are made of structural steel, galvanized and/or powder coated steel, punch plate, perforated metal and grating, Lexan and pattern projectors. These hats form an enclosure or gathering space that viewers can enter to observe the images projected onto each of the hat’s surfaces. These images are an abstract representation of thought – of the person “wearing” the hat and producing the “ideas.”