The Art of Fabrication Curatorial Statement

The University Museums Art on Campus Collection is a unique example of a collection of public works of art that are site specific and publicly accessible at Iowa State. The process of commissioning these public works of art from the perspective of the museum, the intricacies of artists working with the campus community, and building collaborative relationships to care for this collection will be explored in this exhibition. These processes will be described through the connection of Tom Stancliffe’s varied examples of sculptures in the Art on Campus Collection over 30 years, as well as his influence on the University of Northern Iowa’s Public Art Incubator in their work to fabricate and conserve works of art in the Iowa State University Museums collection.

This exhibition is curated by University Museums with support from Rachel Flint and University Museums membership.

Adding public works of art to the Art on Campus Collection and Program is a unique process composed of a working collaboration between artist, museum curators, and the community who will interact with the resulting installation on a daily basis. Particularly within this collection of site-specific works of art, each new sculpture, terrazzo floor, mural, etc. is meant to visually represent a specific aspect of the culture of Iowa State University. Guided by a public art committee, they are tasked with creating a public art statement that summarizes the goals of the installation. The purpose of this statement is not to design what the public work of art should look like, rather, the artist will be tasked with representing innovation in a college or department over the years, the student experience within a college, or simply to create a space that encourages gathering and conversation, inspiration and learning.

The University Museums administers the Art on Campus Collection as well as cares and educates utilizing the public art collection. For the university Museums’ role, the curators work to gather public artists who can uniquely address the needs of the space and the goals of the public art statement. This proactive participation builds a large collection of innovative public artists on Iowa State’s campus, working in a variety of media, and representing vast diversity of experiences, expressions and research.

 Selected artists must take this public art statement and respond within their own visual aesthetic and style. The preparatory drawings and proposal images seen in this exhibition demonstrate how a singular artist, Tom Stancliffe, responds to the needs of the site, the public art statement, and the community commissioning the art, while staying true to his own artistic practice.

Within the development of public art, there is often the unique need of addressing long-term exposure to outdoor elements. Unlike the controlled environment of a museum gallery, new variables arise when presenting art in exterior environments. Can an artist’s design withstand the weather and in Iowa that includes snow, wind, humidity, and large temperature changes? At Iowa State there is the added element to address that thousands of students and faculty will have the opportunity to interact with the public art. This challenge is one that public artists often choose to approach collaboratively with fabricators who specialize in materials such as metals, and those who understand the process of wear and tear that happens naturally in the public environment.

Fabrication of an object in the Art on Campus Collection was Tom Stancliffe’s first introduction to University Museums, as a studio assistant in the mid-1980s to Bruce White, artist of Carom located near the Black Engineering Building. When Stancliffe moved to the University of Northern Iowa (UNI), the relationship between the artist and Iowa State continued.

Having worked in public art and fabrication for years, Stancliffe set out to share this knowledge with the students at UNI, opening the studio experience through the creation of the Public Art Incubator. In the last ten years, over 45 public art projects have been completed by the Public Art Incubator. Within Iowa State University’s Art on Campus Program, selected artists such as Norie Sato and Susan Chrysler White have often sought consultation with the Public Art Incubator to have this group fabricate their designs using the large studio space, and for advice and their expertise in creating long lasting works of art.

Public art as a practice began on Iowa State’s campus with Grant Wood and Christian Petersen, and became particularly widespread in the 1970s with accompanying percent-for-art legislation such as Iowa’s Art in State Buildings program (1979-2017). These projects were also from the start funded through private philanthropy. The tradition of adding public art to new construction and renovated spaces on Iowa State’s campus continues to add visual culture, intellectual expressions and beauty to public spaces. Across the country, many of these works of art that originated from percent-for-art programs are nearing 50 years of exposure to the elements, and this often necessitates a more in-depth course of conservation than the routine annual maintenance of cleaning, waxing, and protecting public sculpture.

At Iowa State’s University Museums, curators and student employees work to continuously maintain the works of public art on campus by performing condition reports, cleaning, photo documentation, database updates, and creating labels for the works of art They also protect the art from damage by waxing, applying chemicals to prevent biological growth, and dusting. The curator supervises any larger professional conservation projects, such as maintenance on fountains, repainting surfaces, or larger conservation treatments beyond the skillset of a general curator. This process takes research into who the prominent experts are in certain materials and matching a professional conservator to the task at hand.

For those larger conservation projects associated with the treatment of metal sculpture in Iowa State’s Art on Campus Collection the University of Northern Iowa through the Public Art Incubator is selected as the professional conservator as seen in the exhibition. In major conservation projects, original artist drawings, paint swatches, and if possible, conversations with the artist are used to guide the conservation of a work of art, to stay as true as possible to the artist’s original intent.