Unbelievable!

As I moaned on January 13th, the city district decided that Jennifer's proposal would interfere with the monumentality of the metro viaduct and that nothing is allowed in the area underneath the tracks. So you may understand my outrage this morning: that same city district has planted trees on exactly the same location as Jennifer’s’ proposed work. Unbelievable!

ZIEZO

This week has been so much better than last!

I walked past the parking garage Kleiburg and Ursem (the contractor) has started the mounting of the pixels of Peter Stel's work. This is the first work of Open Source Amsterdam!

Crunching

Well, as I said before, the financial crisis is hitting us hard also. But yesterday, at a special meeting, the Board of the Street of Sculptures Foundation, decided to go along with our budget cuts and give a full GO on the production of the works of art. Any other cuts have to come from the organisation and communication. I am very grateful.

It is distressing not to be able to realise my dream fully. But when I hear the horror stories around me (galleries not having any sales at all in 4 months, and not informing their artist about any sales they do make, etc) I cannot expect Open Source Amsterdam to be unscathed.

I talked to some artists, and they believe that the slump in the art market is not that much of a bad thing. They believe that people will have more interest in the content of art now, instead of its market value. And that Open Source Amsterdam comes exactly at the right moment. I hope they’re right.

NEW/NEU/NIEUWS/SHINHATSUBAI: James Beckett has joined Open Source Amsterdam

This afternoon James Beckett presented his proposal. The CBK Zuidoost has commissioned James to create a temporary work within the framework of Open Source Amsterdam.

I am very pleased! His work will be a good addition to the event. OSA will showcase a great variety in artistic points of view, media and disciplines.

This is how the process of the project goes right now: good news, disastrous news, bad news, excellent news, bad news...often all within a matter of hours. Only 4 days back from my holiday and getting exhausted already...Thank god for Nienke, Gieneke, Harold and Bert!

My Street of Sculptures

Last Thursday the exhibition My Street of Sculptures opened at the CBK Zuidoost. Unfortunately I could not attend the opening, but today I went over to have a look. Niesje and Annet showed me around and I was very much surprised by both the individual works and the exhibition as a whole.

The CBK Zuidoost developed an educational project for the Street of Sculptures/Open Source Amsterdam. They produced a great DVD for the junior high school students, featuring Jennifer Tee and Pascale Tayou.

The last couple of weeks, groups of students created their interpretation of Open Source Amsterdam and My Street of Sculptures is the result.

It really cheered me up, after this disastrous week...

You can't have it all

Well, I guess you can't have it all....

Before I left for a short holiday, we had some really bad news. Last October we thought the financial crisis may not hurt us that much, but in December Open Source Amsterdam suffered a major financial setback.

Days before my departure, I had to make some painful decisions, cutting in the organisation and communication budget, and - worst of all - the art budget as well. Although we still have a firm GO for the event, there will be maybe only 17 works of art instead of 20.

It took me the whole holiday to get over this and then, on my return, another disaster....

I won't get into details since I am so angry and frustrated about it but the bottom line is that some civil servants the local district council decided that the location of Jennifer Tee's work is not appropriate. Above is a photograph of Jennifer's testing with two 1:1 scale models on site. You be the judge.....

Changing places

One of the most challenging aspects of art in public space is finding the right site. For Open Source Amsterdam, all artists could choose the site for their proposed work. This choice is of course based on artistic grounds: how does the work related to its surrounding in terms of meaning, scale, etc.

However, between dream and reality there are quite some practical obstacles. Can the work be transported to the location? Does the urban planner or architect agree with a work of art within his or her design? Are there any cables, pipes or sewage underneath? Even tree roots and groundwater levels are an issue.

And then of course we have to deal with the sensibilities of the inhabitants. The 1992 air plane crash is still painfully imbedded in the collective memory of the Bijlmer. The Open Source Route passes the Bijlmer Monument, which is the central site for the annual commemoration. It turns out, the area of the commemoration is not just the monument itself, but a large area surrounding it.

Rob Voerman originally choose a location which now turns out to be the within this larger area. After some conversations with the local authorities, we decided it would be best to choose a different location for Rob. I am very pleased (and relieved) that Rob felt the same way.

This meant that Rob had to come again to Amsterdam to search for a new site, which we found rather quickly. Rob even thinks the new location may be better. Now let’s hope there is won’t be any more obstacles…