The challenge for successful public art is that it needs to stay interesting over the long haul. Monuments to civic heroes and murals painted on the sides of highway overpasses draw lots of attention when they first arrive on the scene, but too often, they quickly fade into the background.
There are exceptions — in Denver, that might come in the form of a giant blue bear or an angry blue horse — but for the most part, public art gets less interesting over time as everyday citizens, rushing to work or jogging by for the hundredth time, simply lose interest. Too much of it is a waste of money, even if the projects do pump up the local economy and make the city look exciting to tourists.
Three new pieces installed downtown by artist Paula Castillo have a distinct advantage in staring down that predicament, primarily because of their placement on the grounds of the Denver Art Museum campus and in front of the Denver Central Library.
Rather than being shoved into the faces of passersby who are not particularly concerned about aesthetics, or who have different tastes in art than what they are seeing, these works are actually set in a spot where people seek out paintings and sculptures, where they expect to be challenged intellectually by the things they encounter, and where they give art a chance to unfold over time.
Because of that placement, they have to be high-quality objects that deserve the attention. The stakes for the most prominent of public artworks are high.
Castillo rises to the occasion here by presenting a trio of sculptures that warrant a second or third — or hundredth — look. The pieces understand the city and how it developed over the ages, and ask people to consider those things holistically.
The three works unfold as chapters in the history of the area, going back to before it was the city of Denver, and marking aspects of its physical and cultural evolution. They are meant to reflect the diversity of the population here and the contributions of various demographic groups over time or, as Castillo puts in in her writings, “a centuries-long process of cultural mixing among Indigenous, European, African and Asian peoples.”
The first is “Glyph,” which is set on an outdoor deck extending from the Denver Art Museum’s Ponti Building. It is on museum grounds but rises into public view because it is placed atop a trio of shiny, 10-foot poles that hoist it into the air so it gets noticed. Assisting in that effort is the fact that the stainless steel piece is powder-coated in an eye-popping pink.
“Glyph” is an exaggerated, three-dimensional representation of the xicalcoliuhqui, a motif — or decorative design element — that has long been part of Mesoamerican visual culture, and continues to have a place today. The piece harks back to pre-Columbian times, when it was omnipresent in the ornament of buildings, ceramics, jewelry and other items.
The point of its presence here is to give a place to Indigenous thinking in a part of town where the architecture and landscape have mostly European roots. It is a counter-balance to the Greek-inspired Civic Center across the street, and to the distinctly modern, and post-modern, designs of both the art museum and the library.
The second — and most intriguing piece — is “Trestle,” which is set on an existing, low concrete plinth on the walkway that connects the museum’s newer Libeskind Building addition to 12th Street.
The piece is abstract, and combines — to break it down for the sake of easy discussion — the shape of a railroad trestle adorned with hummingbird feathers. The work consists of 12 laser-cut, stainless steel arch-like elements, set about 2 feet apart from each other, that come together in the form of a truss. Visitors can actually walk under the work, which rises 22 feet off the ground.
“Trestle” pays homage to the role of the railroads in developing the city into what it is today, and to the diversity of the labor that laying the tracks required. It is really about Denver’s transformation, from cowtown to metropolis, from ethnically homogeneous to multi-cultural, from rural to industrial to urban. The piece packs in a lot of history.
The third is “Equis,” on the library’s front lawn. The piece is basically a 12-foot-tall representation of an “X,” the first letter of xicalcoliuhqui, which connects it not so obviously to the “Glyph” piece. (Note: Equis is the Spanish pronunciation of the letter x).
But “Equis” has a much more contemporary, even trendy, flair than “Glyph” because its most obvious reference is the current fad of using “X” instead of “O” or “A” in Spanish words as a way of removing gender designations from the language and making it more inclusive. (One example would be to say “c” rather than “c” or “cDz” to make the words for “boy” or “girl” less loaded politically.)
Think of the sculpture, which is rendered in laminated glass that reflects light in a rainbow of colors, as a broad nod to inclusion as it is manifested today.
In a sense, the works follow a chronology, from the deep past to the recent past to the moment we currently occupy. Though, because the pieces are not physically next to one another, nor can they be viewed as a group all at once, it might be difficult for viewers to see them as connected objects or to link them together as different parts of one expansive narrative.
They do not look like a trilogy, and the fact that they are all so different materially adds to the confusion. That is a conceptual challenge, or shortcoming, that can only be overcome with both some background knowledge on the works and a bit of meandering around the Golden Triangle neighborhood. It is hard to imagine most people giving public art that kind of chance.
But most people should, and they just might, because the works have the good fortune of being set in a place where the good citizens arrive with open minds, a spirit of adventure, a sense of pride, and — thanks to Civic Center’s role as the site of various cultural festivals — an awareness of social differences. If it takes time to consume these objects, well, this is a place where people actually have time.
And Castillo, who lives and works in New Mexico, keeps the journey interesting. She has spent a career connecting the dots between the region’s history, culture and geography. She has a knack for isolating individual moments that matter, and for recreating them in an artistic language that excites viewers enough to reconsider the stories they already know.
The works, crafted to near perfection by the Denver fabricating firm Elmendorf Geurts, are flashy pieces that turn up the volume of the Civic Center area. They are crucial to an ongoing — and very promising — revival that is currently happening in that part of town. Like all public art, they may fade into the background over time. In the short-term, they are about as successful as public art can be.
