The Council announces three new art commissions intended to encourage diverse, imaginative and experimental art and performance projects in Downtown New York, provoking a critical relationship to everyday life, drawing audiences to little known locations, and bringing sharply into focus, if only for a moment, a fragment of urban experience that is easily overlooked.

These projects will be produced in 2007. Stay tuned to this page and sign up for our email newsletter to keep abreast of the latest developments.

Graffiti Research Lab: Tactical Urban Communication Kit
The Graffiti Research Lab (GRL) is not a collective of graffiti artists. We are a group of graffiti engineers and advocates for the refacing of public space. We propose to develop three types of DIY urban communication kits for the display of uncurated, large-scale texts, images and animations in urban environments. We propose to train individuals and community organizations to use these kits in their own public events. One kit be a low cost, self-contained, portable laser projection system that users could load with their texts and images. A second kit would be an add-on hardware package that could turn a digital projector and laptop into a mobile urban projection system. The final kit would include a number of GRL-developed tools like LED Throwies and the Night Writer that allow participants to non-permanently install light-emitting text and images on a range of urban surfaces. Developed in the open source production model, the final designs for all three kits would be distributed on-line as do-it-yourself set of instructions including parts, detailed fabrication methods and application notes. We want to create technology, give it away for free, teach everyday New Yorkers to use it and allow the city to tell its stories.

Jill Magid: Off the Record on the Platform
In the subway, at night, everyone is in transit except the police officers. I recently approached one and asked him to train me. I propose to make a series of works in the subway stations of Lower Manhattan, based on the experience of working the night-shift with this officer whom I shadow, off the record. These works will be unofficially permanent or appear to disappear – as projections, spoken word and objects woven into the station. The exchange – security training for art – is the project’s underlying structure. The police officer does not wish to be taken to see art in exchange for training so I will bring the art to him. We are not entirely sure we should trust each other but we continue to meet despite this. Art will appear in the officers’ domain where training takes place – in security booths on platforms, surveillance monitors, at their desks. It will take the form of text, video, prints, sound, posters stuck directly to the tiles. Works will function autonomously and collectively form a loose narrative. Growing from the moments experiences underground, they will be developed to return there. The first “viewers” are the officers; the public will experience our experience, via text, rumour, evidence or presence.

Yehuda Duenyas (National Theater of the United States of America): One Million Forgotten Moments
Click here to read about the finished project.

I propose to convert a series of storefront windows into tiny theatres where the public is invited to sit inside and watch the city streets. The street and everything on it becomes the backdrop as well as the central character. A barker outside guarantees to provide passersby with “one million forgotten moments for 25c or your money back”. The audience is led through the door of an abandoned storefront and into a street-facing window display lavishly built to be a tiny jewel-box theatre in scale model. As the curtain rises, we reveal to the audience the street, traffic, pedestrians, deliveries, shopping, commerce – the chance encounters and moments that make up the majority of our lives. At certain times, a choreographed performance emerges, transpires and disappears. Both installation and performance are accompanied by a customized automated sound design that uses strategically placed microphones and real-time effects processing to sonically highlight aspects of the location. For the second part of the installation/performance, the audience is revealed to the street through a lighting change.

The Invitation

Ours is an age of record-keeping. We are ushered in and out with certificates. Our lives are registered daily with credit card swipes, internet log-ins, security checks, and surveillance cameras. No longer is memory jogged with the occasional souvenir, aide-mémoire or pressed flower. Every moment is registered for the future by photographs, credit and debit cards, blogs, internet cookies, fingerprints, passports, and caller IDs. To be undocumented is effectively to disappear. If our everyday life is now an archive, how can we forget anymore? What does it mean now to be off the record?

This commission is intended to encourage diverse, imaginative and experimental art and performance projects in Downtown New York, provoking a critical relationship to everyday life, drawing audiences to little known locations, and bringing sharply into focus, if only for a moment, a fragment of urban experience that is easily overlooked.

The Process

In Spring 2006, an advisory board of curators, artists, writers and presenters were invited to nominate artists for the commission. Nominated artists were invited to submit a preliminary proposal in response to a program invitation. From this applicant pool, the Council will select six artists who will each receive a fee to develop a formal proposal. All six projects will present their proposals at a public forum on September 17, 2006 at the Council’s international summit, Cities, Art and Recovery. A panel of jurors will select three projects for final recommendation. The selected projects will be exhibited, performed or displayed during the spring and/or summer of 2007.

First Phase Candidates

Graffiti Research Lab: Tactical Urban Communication Kit
The Graffiti Research Lab (GRL) is not a collective of graffiti artists. We are a group of graffiti engineers and advocates for the refacing of public space. We propose to develop three types of DIY urban communication kits for the display of uncurated, large-scale texts, images and animations in urban environments. We propose to train individuals and community organizations to use these kits in their own public events. One kit be a low cost, self-contained, portable laser projection system that users could load with their texts and images. A second kit would be an add-on hardware package that could turn a digital projector and laptop into a mobile urban projection system. The final kit would include a number of GRL-developed tools like LED Throwies and the Night Writer that allow participants to non-permanently install light-emitting text and images on a range of urban surfaces. Developed in the open source production model, the final designs for all three kits would be distributed on-line as do-it-yourself set of instructions including parts, detailed fabrication methods and application notes. We want to create technology, give it away for free, teach everyday New Yorkers to use it and allow the city to tell its stories.

Phillip Buehler: Living off the Record
I propose to create a multi-channel video which documents the daily ritual of a homeless person who “lives off the record”. 200,000 of the nation’s 600,000 homeless are severely mentally ill. They don’t carry credit cards, they have no telephone, no ban account, not ATM card, no utility bills, no address and no e-mail. They live in plain view yet they are unnoticed. Of particular interest to me are the shopping carts which are a sort of wagon train that represents home. I hope to raise questions in people’s minds about how the homeless are already living off the record? Are they more free because they can’t be tracked, because they leave no trail? I will work with a homeless outreach group in Lower Manhattan. The final installation will be a multi-channel video installation projected on to interiors and/or walls of buildings.

Yehuda Duenyas (National Theater of the United States of America): One Million Forgotten Moments
I propose to convert a series of storefront windows into tiny theatres where the public is invited to sit inside and watch the city streets. The street and everything on it becomes the backdrop as well as the central character. A barker outside guarantees to provide passersby with “one million forgotten moments for 25c or your money back”. The audience is led through the door of an abandoned storefront and into a street-facing window display lavishly built to be a tiny jewel-box theatre in scale model. As the curtain rises, we reveal to the audience the street, traffic, pedestrians, deliveries, shopping, commerce – the chance encounters and moments that make up the majority of our lives. At certain times, a choreographed performance emerges, transpires and disappears. Both installation and performance are accompanied by a customized automated sound design that uses strategically placed microphones and real-time effects processing to sonically highlight aspects of the location. For the second part of the installation/performance, the audience is revealed to the street through a lighting change.

Patrick Killoran: Imagi-Mart
The Imagi-Mart is an innovative retail concept that sells nothing to the consumer but generates the highest imaginary profits. A retail store, it is staffed by actors who play the part of sales people and act as though the store is filled with invisible merchandise. When visitors enter the store, they see the staff stocking invisible shelves with invisible products, helping customers find phantom merchandise and completing transactions with make-believe money. Everyone who enters the store is eventually approached by a sales person and asked, “What can I help you find?” or “What are you looking for?” Visitors can ask questions, browse, shop and compare; they can pay with imaginary money and the staff will even help carry the products to the car. By providing nothing, the customers’s selection is limited only by their imagination. The work will culminate in a pair of videos – one, a training video for Imagi-Mart employees and the other, a promotion for buying a franchise.

Damon Rich: The Defeat of Urban Renewal
I propose mobile kiosk for distributing a series of magazines about the recent history of the architectural environment. These magazines will be produced in consultation with organizations working on built environment issues – tenant advocates, real estate developers, planning groups, environmentalists, high school students, maybe others. Over a period of time, the kiosk will move across Manhattan, making stops in building lobbies and public spaces. The kiosk will be staffed by a knowledgeable attendant and will occasionally be used as the starting point for walking tours and other events.

Jill Magid: Off the Record on the Platform
In the subway, at night, everyone is in transit except the police officers. I recently approached one and asked him to train me. I propose to make a series of works in the subway stations of Lower Manhattan, based on the experience of working the night-shift with this officer whom I shadow, off the record. These works will be unofficially permanent or appear to disappear – as projections, spoken word and objects woven into the station. The exchange – security training for art – is the project’s underlying structure. The police officer does not wish to be taken to see art in exchange for training so I will bring the art to him. We are not entirely sure we should trust each other but we continue to meet despite this. Art will appear in the officers’ domain where training takes place – in security booths on platforms, surveillance monitors, at their desks. It will take the form of text, video, prints, sound, posters stuck directly to the tiles. Works will function autonomously and collectively form a loose narrative. Growing from the moments experiences underground, they will be developed to return there. The first “viewers” are the officers; the public will experience our experience, via text, rumour, evidence or presence.

The exterior frame around the audience is also decorated like a proscenium. Suddenly, there are two audiences, inside and outside, and everyone is on display.

Advisory Committee

Holly Block, Art in General
Bill Bragin, Joe’s Pub
Amanda McDonald Crowley, Eyebeam
Boo Froebel, Lincoln Center Festival
Olivia Georgia, Bronx Museum of the Arts
RoseLee Goldberg, Performa
Lynn Gumpert, Grey Art Gallery, New York University
Danny Hoch, performer
Marie Howe, poet
Bob Holman, Bowery Poetry Project
Carin Kuoni, Vera List Center for Art and Politics
David Lang, Bang on a Can
Kristin Marting, HERE
Pepón Osorio, artist
Mark Russell, Time-Based Festival of the Arts, Seattle
Gregory Sholette, artist
Leo Rubinfien, photographer
Walid Raad, Atlas Group/Cooper Union
Lynne Tillman, writer
Eugenie Tsai, PS1
Laurie Uprichard, Danspace