HAVE YOU SEEN THIS YET?

Risk-taking prevails in all walks of life and business. Calculated or intuited on likely outcomes—some decisions involve bigger stakes than others. Few real decisions manage not to involve a gamble. In business and in design, risk is a vital ingredient for progress. The action of not seizing an opportunity ends up equating to a loss, i.e. one takes a risk by not taking a risk.1

Public art is intended to communicate to the local community, or it may address a much larger audience. That essential function is not a simple one— does it aim to raise awareness, can it offend? Is it, or does it become, irrelevant? A contemporary theme or idea may have a shelf life, or perhaps the idea may not be relevant until years later. Perhaps it is a marker of time. Like songs and movies, some works can become classics. A vision may be seen as timeless or ahead of its time—but by whom?

I was first fascinated by Las Vegas back in 1995, when the late Felicia Campbell (Professor, Department of English, UNLV) invited me to experience the city after she heard my talk on souvenir design at a conference in Montreal presented by the University of Nevada, Reno.2 So, taken by the ubiquity of the Silver City, I soon changed my thesis to The Architecture of Risk (1997–2005), basing my research in Vegas. 2 Tan, Laurens, The Mass-Customization of Cultural Identity, University of Technology Sydney, 1995

At that time I was beginning to focus on large public-facing artworks, so the image of Las Vegas and the idea of public art are close together in my mind. I’ve lived and worked as an artist and educator in Australia and the US as well as Beijing, where I lease a studio. My public works range from permanent sculptures such as Hellbent, which has been on display at the Burwood campus of Melbourne’s Deakin University since 2018, to temporary installations like my inflatable Three Wise Monkeys, designed for the City of Sydney’s Lunar New Year celebrations in 2016. After practicing successfully on three different continents, I think my views on public art are blessed with the benefit of a well-traveled hindsight and working experience.3

3 In 1995, I won a major public commission for the Capitol Theatre in Sydney: Octogene. Also in 1995 I was invited to construct a large video installation, …well, the image is one thing… which opened at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston in an exhibition curated by Wendy McDaris (University of Memphis). Hellbent (2005) was a finalist in Australia’s McClelland National Sculpture Award. As Weeks Go By, another work from the same year, was a finalist in the Helen Lempriere National Sculpture Award. In 2006, I was awarded an Australia-China Council residency in Beijing. Two other awards followed and before long I was convinced that living and working in Beijing had a real significance for my work. Since then I have moved my practice between China, Las Vegas, and Australia, while my large-scale installations and sculptures continue to flourish with curated exhibitions and commissioned works in major hotels and museums.

One of the most successful public artworks I know is Sir Anish Kapoor’s Cloud Gate in Millennium Park, Chicago. It is a perfect example of how an artist’s vision and background can capably manage sculptural material in such a way as to create a universal and iconic voice. The work is based on liquid mercury. I can’t now imagine Chicago without Kapoor’s “Bean,” as it’s fondly called. Perhaps in a different way, I can’t picture New York without Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi’s Statue of Liberty, or Paris without the Eiffel Tower, or (in architecture) Bilbao without Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum, or Beijing without Rem Koolhaas’ CCTV Headquarters. (Which leads me to the point that architecture and larger public sculpture are very close cousins and both are indeed capable of spelling out a city’s iconography or making a significant stride towards it.)

All of these works were put in place by cities that were able to commit money and time to the project. They were also able to hire the best people and thoughtfully consider the matter of where the sculpture should be placed. The Bean is a wonderful work of art in itself, but the placement, scale, and budget are important supports for such success. Decades of significant work by Kapoor led to Chicago awarding him this major public work, and at $28 million it’s considered to be money well spent. Their willingness to treat the commission seriously has been well rewarded.

Of course there aren’t any comparably funded public sculptures in Las Vegas—the results reflect vast differences as, by comparison, projects here suffer from lackluster funding, downscaling, or awkward placement. The successes or failures of our sculptural artworks ultimately lead to bigger questions about the local art scene.

Recent open calls for public sculpture indicate that Vegas is open to new work in parks and streetscapes, but the funding often makes for difficult economics. Apart from the key cost of design and fabrication, artists have to bear the cost of traffic management during installation, and other administration and liability insurance. By the end of the process they may (typically) discover that they have been working for nothing because most of their fee has gone to the fabricators.

Compare this to the open calls for Sydney’s Chinese Lunar Festival, where the chosen artist is paid a designer’s fee and the search for fabrication contractors is handled separately by the City Council, whose staff is versed in cost and safety requirements.

I have listed the following recent public sculptures in Las Vegas as examples.

• Luis Varela-Rico’s Radial Symmetry (2018), Main Street and Commerce Street, Downtown. Made of repeated steel forms, the geometric sculpture references two baskets by the Las Vegas Paiute Tribe, the original inhabitants of the region. This visually striking work directs us to the relationship between mathematics and nature. Varela-Rico is a unique sculptor as he fabricates and designs his work using computer graphics linked to heavy mechanical engineering equipment.

• Wayne Littlejohn’s Dream Machine (2016), Siegfried & Roy Park; described by the artist as “…some mysterious atomic love child of dust devils and drones.” It has an imposing presence as its bold design towers above its airport surroundings. The entire 26-foot sculpture was fabricated out of state.

• Adolfo Gonzalez’s OctoSteam (2016) along the Pecos-McLeod Interconnect, is a complex work of fantasy concocting a historic sci-fi. In its current location it can’t be appreciated as traffic drives by too fast. This work needs to be relocated to a park or grounds where viewers can see it up-close and in the round, illustrating that sculptures occasionally would benefit from a review of their location.

• Miguel Rodriguez’s Jaguar (2016), McLeod Drive, opposite the Winchester Dondero Cultural Center. A folkloric figurative work which similarly suffers from a lack of viewing height and an underwhelming location.

• Jesse Carson Smigel’s Snowball in Vegas (2014), First Street and Coolidge Avenue, Downtown—its better location and scale makes for easy viewing and appreciation by pedestrians and slow-moving traffic alike.

Tourists want a different kind of authenticity—one that’s more dramatic and more animated. The tourist seeks an experience different and distant from home, and doesn’t mind if it’s constructed.4

4 Dean MacCannell in “The Last Resort.” The Tourist, BBC, 1996, radio series.

Las Vegas has become a large metropolis and unlike other cities its existence is almost exclusively funded by tourism dollars, arguably a blessing in many ways. Its growth has been nothing short of astounding. But the true heart of “Vegas Art” has conversely suffered as it is left behind in the wake of the multibillion-dollar entertainment sector. This is exemplified by the Sphere, a newcomer in the arena. At $2.3 billion, we are able to experience animations projected at a great height and scale—a world first and a unique spectacle.

Art has not had it easy in this city of almost three million, as witnessed by the offhanded closure of key museums—the Guggenheim designed by Koolhaas (2001– 08), and the Las Vegas Art Museum (1997–2009)—now part of the Sahara West Library. Many privately owned contemporary galleries have also closed—Dust (2003– 08), Trifecta (2004 –10), and others. Michelle Quinn, a significant local art world figure who founded MCQ Fine Art, is currently an art advisor without a gallery. There are galleries operating now that are finding it difficult to be adventurous because the marketplace looks to New York and Los Angeles for serious art.

We are constantly aware of the difference between public and private spending on art. The amount the casinos spend is vastly different to what we see elsewhere. The big money in local public art is still confined to the Strip—big projects and large sums of money are sprinkled through the casinos, signposted with famous names: Daniel Libeskind, Damien Hirst,

Maya Lin, Nancy Rubins, Jeff Koons. Gamblers and tourists are surrounded by a symphony of images and merchandise in a staged fantasy environment, and art is part of this fantasy. As distinct consumer groups, their environments are designed to attract them, keep them there, or keep them coming back for more. The casinos see this expenditure as an investment— the artworks are marketing tools and often they are later sold at a profit. There is no need to reinvent what is already proven a success elsewhere.

In conclusion, public sculpture can add considerably to the stature of Las Vegas. We can cultivate a contextual identity that would complement this city’s ubiquitous façade. I’m sure no one would disagree that our overriding aim should be to advance the role and quality of public sculpture in the wider Las Vegas community and to foster design development by local artists and infrastructure alike. It’s the way forward, achieved through strategic and supportive funding for future public sculpture projects.

DR. LAURENS TAN

Laurens Tan is an Australian curator, educator, sculptor, and transdisciplinary artist. His work links sculpture, architectural and animated narrative space, graphics, industrial design, video and music. He has a Doctor of Creative Arts in Communications and Media from the University of Technology Sydney. Tan’s work has been exhibited at institutions around the world, including the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, Iberia Center of Contemporary Art, Today Art Museum, the National Gallery of Australia. He has been an artist-in-residence in China, Australia, Canada, and France.