UH Public ART: Art on Main- Public Art Proposal

The City of Auburn in Washington State has put out an RFP for artists to create within a window-front space which will be on display to the public 24/7 for 2 1/2 months in 2017. They seek artwork that will "engage the community and activate downtown Auburn."

In researching the city online I found it hard to get a feel for their specific culture or identity, everything that came to mind were ideas I could use in Seattle as well (only 30min drive). Therefore I decided to take a different approach than trying to interpret the city as an outsider and instead recreate the city in a way which the residents can engage with their home. My inspiration originally came from "Where's Waldo" books, the idea of bringing people to the window-front to find something specific within an image of their city. This then led me to recall prints of the New York Skyline and of Manhattan that I grew up with displayed on my wall by the artist Tony Graham. Along the border of the prints were things to find within the busy city drawing and even points for each find, this I believe could be fun for all ages on a larger scale.

The intended site is a store-front window on Main St. in Auburn, WA. The size of the piece will take up the space of the window area (regular retail windows are about 12ft high, 20ft wide, and 3ft deep).
Therefore the scale of this piece will be roughly 12'x20'x3'.

The budget for this project is $1,000. With this money I will purchase the thin wood needed to create the 3D city map, paint to color the map, and the necessary lighting so that the piece can be viewed easily twenty-four hours a day.

The following images should help one to better understand my concept.

My Sketch of the window-front: