The Art of Public Space
By Laura Dean, Director of Parks and Public Spaces
The Downtown Detroit Partnership is recognized for creating and caring for award-winning parks and public spaces that welcome millions of visitors to Downtown Detroit each year. I have the great privilege of working alongside our Parks and Public Spaces team, where everything from seasonal plantings and beautiful gardens to weekly programming and the daily care of our spaces is centered around creating a great visitor experience and memorable moments in the heart of the city.
Public spaces also give us a unique opportunity to showcase the arts in many different forms, including visual art, music, dance, theater, design and even figure skating, and make those experiences accessible to everyone. They give us a chance to introduce people to something new and bring art and creativity into places they visit every day.
Over the past 10 years, public art has been one of the most exciting ways we’ve been able to do that. Bringing temporary installations into DDP-managed parks and public spaces allows us to transform familiar places, try something different, and connect visitors with artists from Detroit and around the world. Some of my favorite projects are the ones that have completely changed how people experience a familiar space.
Horizon, created by Olivier Landreville and presented by Creos, brought five interactive, illuminated structures to Beacon Park. Visitors could sit inside, rock and experience changing light and sound. It was completely different from anything we had brought to the park before, and people really embraced it.
Another favorite was the Musical Swings at Cadillac Square, created by Montreal-based art and design studio Daily tous les jours. The installation turned something as simple as swinging into a shared musical experience. Each swing triggered different musical notes, and as people swung together, new melodies emerged. Kids loved them, adults loved them, and complete strangers ended up creating something together.
I’ve also loved the many light projection shows we’ve produced in partnership with Mindfield, using the historic GAR Building as a canvas. There is something incredible about taking a piece of Downtown architecture that people may pass every day and transforming it with light, movement, and art.
That sense of discovery is one of the things I love most about temporary public art. It gives us the opportunity to experiment and use our spaces differently. An installation can be here for a few weeks or a season, create thousands of experiences and memories, and then make way for something completely new.
But the arts in our public spaces extend well beyond installations.
Over the years, our parks have become stages for an incredible range of talent. We’ve welcomed Olympic and U.S. champion figure skaters to The Rink at Campus Martius Park, Grammy-winning artists, Motown legends and countless Detroit musicians and performers.
Some of Detroit’s leading cultural institutions have also brought their work outside of their traditional venues and into our public spaces. The Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Opera and Broadway in Detroit have all offered free performances in DDP-managed parks, giving visitors the chance to experience some of Detroit’s best arts and culture right in the heart of Downtown.
That access is important to me. You don’t always need a ticket or even a plan to experience great art. You might be walking through a park and suddenly find yourself listening to the symphony, watching an opera performance or seeing an Olympic skater perform just a few feet away.
Our connection to Detroit’s creative community continues in other ways, too. This year, The Shop at Campus Martius has given us another opportunity to work directly with local artists, designers, makers and small businesses. From locally designed goods to products created specifically for Campus Martius Park, the Shop gives visitors another way to discover and support creators here in Detroit.
September is a fitting time to celebrate creativity with Detroit Month of Design. Detroit is the first and only U.S. city designated a UNESCO City of Design, a distinction that recognizes our history of design and innovation, along with the creative community that continues to shape the city today.
Our newest public art installation, Gallantly Streaming, is another example of how art can transform a familiar space. Red, white and blue streamers are suspended above the lawn at Campus Martius Park, creating movement, color and shade. The installation is part of DDP’s An American Summer Sendoff and will remain in Campus Martius Park through Labor Day.
Whether it’s an art installation, a live performance, an unexpected moment on the ice or the work of a local maker, the arts give us another way to bring people together, support our creative community, and create memorable experiences in our public spaces.
That, to me, is the art of public space.
Laura Dean, CMP, is Director of Parks and Public Spaces for the Downtown Detroit Partnership. She oversees the care, programming and visitor experience of DDP’s Downtown parks and public spaces, working with community partners, small businesses, cultural institutions and artists to create welcoming and memorable experiences throughout Downtown Detroit.
