Fargo wants public art
FARGO — Public art has recently become a popular topic in Fargo, leading to discussions that flow from City Hall to museums and from artists’ studios into neighborhoods.
In three days last week, three different meetings focused on three different projects in the community. Each event had different details and goals, but those involved agreed: Fargo needs more public art.
“Public art has helped to enliven our cities, make focal points and create vivid and memorable images of who we are, where we are,” said Colleen Sheehy, director and CEO of the Plains Art Museum. “It helps create loyalty to a place. A way to say, ‘Good things happen here. I want to be here, I want to stay here.’ It’s about creating a vital place that will be successful for young people, businesses and tourism.”
Artists and public administrators agree that outdoor art would not only make the city more visibly appealing, but could also add vitality and a sense of identity to the community. And an iconic work of art could be a calling card for the metro area, much in the way “Spoon Bridge and Cherry” is for Minneapolis.
That message was clear Tuesday at a forum for GO2030, Fargo’s still-in-the-works comprehensive plan, and echoed Thursday at the Sodbuster Summit at the Plains, where ideas for the future of the “Sodbuster” sculpture were shared.
Also on Thursday, a Fargo city planner met with artists about working with the community on potential rain water retention ponds called “The Fargo Project.”
“The artists bring a culturally relevant point of view” reflecting on the region, said Nicole Crutchfield, planner and landscape architect with the city.
“I think that integrating art and at least having artists look at projects as they are being developed helps us design for happiness,” said Mike Williams, a Fargo city commissioner who has promoted and participated in GO2030 meetings.
Moorhead native Michael Strand moved away after graduating from high school in 1987. He returned in 2009, excited about how the area has grown and evolved, but said an iconic piece of art could help define the area.
“There is still a lot of work that needs to be done in having an image for the city,” said Strand, the head of the ceramics department at North Dakota State University. “I want us to develop an aesthetic in the city that represents who we are and, quite frankly, makes us a more beautiful place to live.”
It isn’t just an artist’s perspective.
“I really think we lack that iconic piece of art that defines Fargo and downtown,” said Mike Hahn, head of the Downtown Community
Partnership.
“I love public art,” Martha Berryhill said after Tuesday’s GO2030 forum. “It makes people stop and think.”
While Fargo has some visible outdoor works, like Rollo the Viking near the Sons of Norway or “Atlanter,” the giant image of the giant man in a suit holding up the Island Park Parking Ramp on Main Avenue, or the cowboy smiling over his whiskey on the south side of the McCormick Building at 320 5th St. N., those pieces are often passed by without provoking thought.
And though the Plains wants to get the memorable “Sodbuster” back outside for all too see, Sheehy said the fiberglass sculpture of a man leading a team of oxen may not be the best piece to represent the community.
“I don’t know if ‘Sodbuster’ becomes that iconic piece,” Sheehy said. “I would love to see an inventive, monumental piece.”
While there is and has been a recent show of support for public art in Fargo-Moorhead, it wasn’t always that way.
Few pieces typify this more than Luis Jiménez’s Sodbuster sculpture, (the full name is “Sodbuster San Isidro,” a reference to the patron saint of agriculture). The fiberglass work was purchased by the Fargo Parking Authority for $40,000, with half of that coming from the National Endowment of the Arts.
It was installed in 1982 at the corner of Broadway and Main Avenue in Fargo and the reviews were mixed. While some people admired the muscular forms of a farmer and a pair of ox working the field, others objected to the bold colors and slick, shiny, fiberglass surface. One letter to the editor in The Forum called it “piece of trash.”
Lamb is a reporter for The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead, which is owned by
Forum Communications Co.