Artblog | Essays

July 23, 2016 by Mari Shaw

A Library of the Future at Temple University

Inspired by the academies of ancient Greece and Byzantium, the new Temple Library is designed to create pleasurable–and hence optimal–learning experiences. The visual anchor of the building will be an updated take on a characteristic element of Classical architecture–the oculus, a round opening centered in the dome of a building. Like a latter-day Roman Pantheon, the new Temple library will have a giant oculus in the center of its 3-story atrium that will allow natural light to permeate the 225,000 square-foot structure and orient visitors no matter where they are inside the building.

July 17, 2016 by Hammam Aldouri

The One Percent

The question that I constantly ask myself when thinking about a phenomenon such as Percent for Art is quite straightforward: what kind of experience does public art funded by Percent for Art produce? I think this question needs to be posed whenever we find ourselves before public art, especially if one considers that, in periods of urban rejuvenation, public art will become increasingly visible.

February 21, 2016 by Hammam Aldouri

Response to “LOVE stays in the picture”

Why should we celebrate Indiana’s public artwork? It is, to my mind, not at all clear why the approval by the Arts Commission constitutes, as Kyu puts it, “a hugely positive sign”.

February 10, 2016 by Dave Kyu

LOVE stays in the picture

LOVE Park, officially known as John F. Kennedy Plaza (see footnote), will be undergoing its major renovation this year. The Art Commission has already approved this design, with the caveat that they include two water fountains.

January 12, 2016 by Hammam Aldouri

On immanence (2): Continued reflections on critical art practice

In this essay, I want to further develop the idea of art’s immanence by focusing on a well-known text by the German philosopher and critic Walter Benjamin: “The Author as Producer” (1934). With the help of Benjamin’s text, we will begin to have a clearer idea of the way in which artists can function under the conditions of capitalism, that is, of what it means to be an artist “in” capitalism.

January 3, 2016 by Hammam Aldouri

On immanence (1): Continued reflections on critical art practice

Art is not an “autonomous” realm of cultural production that is cut off from, or outside, the unfolding of everyday life. Rather, it is something that takes place within reality at a given socio-historical moment. I would like to build on these initial reflections by developing the very idea of this “taking place within”. I will refer to this, more precisely, as art’s immanence (I take this word to mean here, quite simply, a status of “being within something,” a kind of “indwelling”).

December 10, 2015 by Dave Kyu

May I Have a Drink?

The design of LOVE Park represents a trend of civic agencies shifting the responsibility of clean drinking water to private entities. Clean water should be a right, not a right if you have $1.25.

November 29, 2015 by Hammam Aldouri

On critical art practice: some preliminary reflections