Suffering for Art

The 150 N. Michigan Avenue Building may be one of the few 1980's buildings that has aged well,but the sculpture that stands in its small plaza has not. Yaacov Agam's Communication X9 is set to reappear in public in the spring of 2008 after a nearly three-year restoration process. A Harvard-trained art restorer was hired to repair the 43-foot column, which had suffered more than 20 years of harsh Chicago winters. However, the restoration isn't up to Agam's standards because there's "no  movement in the color," and if the tone of one panel is off by a little bit, the whole sculpture suffers, the entire city suffers, and most importantly, the artist suffers. "It's not an Agam," huffed the artist. "It's an abuse of the artist, and an abuse of the public, to misrepresent the sculpture as mine."

Agam has hired a lawyer who's waving around the 1990 Visual Artists Rights Act, which was intended to present the desecration of artworks. Agam may be out of luck, though, because his work was completed in 1981 and he doesn't own it any more. The law was intended to prevent the wanton destruction of public art, and Agam has a tough case to prove that X9 has been desecrated after the restoration, especially considering Agam was paid $18,000 for his contributions. As for abuse of the public, I don't recall the column looking like a new way of representing movement in art, as one of its supporters claims. Rather, it looked more like a bad 1980's sweater. The subtle changes in color as one walks by, Agam's signature effect, wasn't that arresting.

This isn't to say the artwork doesn't deserve a careful and professional restoration, but to invoke a law intended for real crimes against art for trivial matters of color matching is the real abuse of the public. Public works of art inevitably suffer some indignities, especially from the weather. An artwork worthy of public funding should take this into account. No one from Picasso's estate has hired a lawyer to remove the rust from his sculpture in the Daley Center plaza. Suing over the Pantone values of a minor work of art, especially since the color effects will be lost in a winter or two anyway, trivializes an important issue in American public space.

Comments

[ArturoToscanini]

The Picasso sculpture at Daley Plaza in Chicago is made of COR-TEN steel. If exposed to weather for several years, COR-TEN steel forms a protective layer of rust on its surface. The rust is an integral property of the sculpture as designed and intended by its creator, Pablo Picasso.

It appears that someone has tampered with the surface of the Picasso sculpture. We feel that there should be an explanation by public officials as to what was done and why.

The exactitude of the colors and their interrelatedness is key to Agam’s work. He is an internationally recognized artist and the authenticity of this major sculpture is dependent on retaining the integrity of the original colors.

[Richard Prouty]

I wasn't aware that anyone was tampering with the Daley Center Picasso. I was there just a few weeks ago and it seemed fine, but I wasn't looking that closely.

I've never cared for Agam's sculpture on Michigan Avenue. The color coordination is maladroit and the form inelegant. That's not really my point, though: Picasso designed his sculpture to be outside. Agram wants his sculpture to be exempt from the effects of Chicago weather, and he's using the legal system to enforce that claim.