ArtNet: A New $4.5 Million Public Art Initiative Aims to Create ‘More Inclusive and Equitable’ Monuments. The First Selection Is Coming to the National Mall
A New $4.5 Million Public Art Initiative Aims to Create ‘More Inclusive and Equitable’ Monuments. The First Selection Is Coming to the National Mall
ArtNet’s Julie Baumgardner wrote about Beyond Granite and its roster of exciting creatives who are creating the first inaugural exhibition on the National Mall as a part of its inaugural “Pulling Together” exhibit.
“Funded by a $4.5 million grant from the Mellon Foundation, in partnership with the Trust for the National Mall, the National Capital Planning Commission and the National Park Service, the project is “the result of federal and local agencies who are invested and compelled in how the past/present/future of our monuments live together, and see art at the core of that,” Farber said. He added that “part of the mission is to have a coalition effort to imagine art as a way forward.”
“To do a public art project of this scale and magnitude, with sensitivity, really encourages us to think about how we can be together as a people again,” Tillet said. “It feels like often there isn’t a lot to be optimistic about. I think when people come together and see themselves in monuments and understand other histories and people they hadn’t before, with compassion and a sense of community, with this creative backdrop, it’s really inspiring. At least for me. I hope it inspires all of us to see each other as a citizenry through these gatherings.”
Photo by Monument Lab
Beyond Granite, funded by the Mellon Foundation, invites visionary artists to create special commemorative exhibits, performances, and installations on the National Mall and throughout the District of Columbia that will expand the public's imagination and understanding and create a more a more inclusive, equitable, and representative process for commemoration on the National Mall – and beyond.
”Pulling Together,” the inaugural exhibition of Beyond Granite, will feature installations and exhibits or prototype monuments, on the National Mall and in Washington, DC from leading contemporary artists that respond to a central curatorial question: What stories remain untold on the National Mall?
The Trust for the National Mall is honored to be working with the Mellon Foundation and its partners The National Capitol Planning Commission and the National Park Service to bring this new series to life to tell the fuller American story in the commemorative landscape.