PUBLIC ART: Masterpieces for the masses

Sculptures, landscaping and murals to be found across Las Vegas Valley

Most cities have a fair amount of public art, which serves the purpose of beautifying, enlightening and gentrifying. It's easy when thinking of public art in Las Vegas to think solely of the giant kitsch and classical reproductions on the Strip, but residents know that is by far not the whole story.

Tucked away in the assorted neighborhoods of our city, there is art to be found and enjoyed. Some is easier to find than others and some stretch the definition of what is commonly perceived of as art, but there's more of it than most folks would imagine and public art is definitely a growing concern in the valley.

The city has earmarked 1 percent of its construction budget for public art, but the city encompasses a relatively small part of the valley, and the county has no such earmarks. Much of the art is installed by the builders of a community and local businesses. Actual publicly funded art is still a relatively rare thing.

Since 2002, the state has had a master plan that includes landscaping aesthetic improvements as appropriate when working on capacity expansion projects. Up to 3 percent of a project's budget can be utilized for this, which has resulted in sculptures, landscaping and murals at several key points in the valley.

"Well, what you call murals, I think of as aesthetic treatment on a closed abutment," said Jim Souba, Nevada Department of Transportation assistant director of engineering. "I'm an engineer."

Patrick Gaffey, cultural program supervisor for Clark County, said "Public Art can be just about anything if you have a professional artist working on it," although how one defines "professional" is still up for debate.

Even hiring a professional doesn't guarantee that a piece will be embraced by the public. Readers whose memories stretch all the way back to 2001 will remember the Ground Zero sculpture, which for eight years clung to the wall of city hall like so much abstract Plexiglas ivy.

The sculpture of the giant flashlight near Artemus W. Hamm Concert Hall on the campus of UNLV would be a notable piece of public art in any city. It is the piece of public artwork in town created by perhaps the most famous artist. While Claes Oldenburg may not be a household name, his certainly is a name with which anyone involved in the fine arts is well acquainted.

He is primarily known for his giant sculptures of household objects, and the UNLV flashlight is one of the finest examples of his work.

The work's presence here is owed in part to current UNLV professor Tom Holder's chatting up Oldenburg at an opening in Pasadena, Calif.

"I told him Las Vegas would be a wonderful place for one of his pieces," said Holder. "A few years later, things fell into place and it was here."

The statue represents a flashlight facing down. Closely examined, the on/off switch is the silhouette of Sunrise and Frenchman mountains.

While it is frequently referred to as Oldenburg's Flashlight, the piece is, in fact, the first official collaboration between the artist and his wife, Coosje van Bruggen.

After their marriage in 1977, van Bruggen began to have an increasing degree of influence on Oldenburg's work. Initially, her contributions were limited to simple "what do you think of this" questions, but by the time the flashlight was created in 1981, it had grown into a full-blown artistic partnership.

The original designs called for the light to point up and shine a spotlight into the sky over the city, but, as Eugene Moehring notes in "The University of Nevada Las Vegas: A History," the Federal Aviation Administration objected to that.

Actually, the change had nothing to do with fear of light pollution, but was an aesthetic decision initiated by van Bruggen. It also was she that altered the design from a solid shaft to a series of planes radiating out from the core.

The finished piece looks less like a misplaced giant's tool than it does a great, dark cactus, illuminated from within.

Curiously, while it is arguably our city's finest piece of world-class art, it is almost a secret treasure known only to locals and artists.