$3 million Spiky towers are the talk of the highway

[The Straight Story]

Spiky towers are the talk of the highway

Council Bluffs, Ia. - Art lovers hoped to provoke a discussion about public art when they commissioned a $3 million set of metal sculptures titled "Odyssey" at the 24th Street interchange on Interstate Highway 29/80 near the Iowa-Nebraska border.

They succeeded far beyond expectations. Suddenly, almost everybody in the Omaha-Council Bluffs area and well beyond seems to have become an art critic. They're voicing their opinions - mostly critical - in local newspapers, on the Internet, and to anyone else willing to listen.

The towering abstract artwork, created by renowned international sculptor Albert Paley for the Iowa West Foundation, was installed in August on four corners of a highway overpass bridge. It's intended to represent the transformation of the land through machinery and agriculture.

Many describe the jagged-edge contemporary sculptures in unflattering terms, a few are enamored by the artwork and others are simply baffled. One critic labeled Odyssey the "Nightmare on 24th Street," a reference to a 1984 slasher movie. A Nebraska man told police he was so distracted by the head-turning sculptures that he rear-ended another car.



http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20101126/NEWS/11260351/1001/Spiky-3-million-towers-are-the-talk-of-the-highway

[BlueJazz]

1. I like it . I see the destruction of of the working class in it ...and other things.

[The Straight Story]

4. I like the way it flows, hard to focus on just one area (nt)

[Canuckistanian]

17. I like the way it PREVENTS flow

Flow is overrated.

[sammytko]

34. i like it also - looks like a plow in a swirl of industry

[proud2BlibKansan]

2. I was there two weeks ago. These are really cool.

I even stopped and took pictures.

[Dappleganger]

3. LOVE it!

Anything is better than that giant Jesus statue.

[jberryhill]

5. This is why traffic circles are great

In places with lots of traffic circles, folks find the most intersting things to put in the island in the middle of them.

[The Straight Story]

7. I used to live in Bakersfield and remember Garces circle:

[blondeatlast]

6. Reminds me of arizona State route 51's notorious pots:

http://joeorman.shutterace.com/Bizarre/Bizarre_Pots.html

[The Straight Story]

8. All I can say about that is, it reminds me of this:

[pa28]

9. Maybe they'll learn to love it.

Representational art misses just as often so it's not always the solution. See Portland's (in)famous "family night at the Y"

http://www.flickr.com/photos/41894180030@N01/386009710/

[the redcoat]

10. Sorry, not a big "abstract" fan

Putting random shapes together and saying "This means what I say it means because I'm the artist" does nothing for me.

I wonder what was so wrong with painting some public murals that certainly wouldn't have cost $3 million.

I don't mean to belittle the artist's work, but it's just not for me.

[Odin2005]

12. Abstract "art" is mostly pretentious crap for fellow snobs.

Us "philistines" are not meant to understand it, the snobs would feel humiliated if us little people "understood" their crap because their self-esteem is based on their snobbery.

[cherokeeprogressive]

13. LOL... Something we can agree on.

I remember seeing a cartoon once of an art critic much like myself standing in front of an abstract painting explaining the piece...

"I call it Cum To Me because it looks like cum to me."

[TroglodyteScholar]

22. Hah! n/t

[The Straight Story]

14. I think of abstract like Rorschach - Don't care what the artist says it is, make up my own mind

I like this particular piece as it is not something I can just glance at and then look away. There is a lot to see.

Probably not good though on a busy road though :)

[Canuckistanian]

18. I'm with you. Just give me some dogs playing poker.

Now, THAT'S art.

[Mojorabbit]

20. Not my cup of tea either. nt

[lib_wit_it]

21. Abstract artists don't put "random" shapes together any more than musicians put random notes

together. Particular notes, often within the same key, are chosen specifically to express something.

I don't know a lot about it, but it seems to me that the abstract artist puts together elements in a similar fashion. As in both music and any other sort of art, I'm curious as to what the artist meant to express. I won't necessarily get out of it what the artist intended, but I get something.

Frankly, I don't always bother to ascertain what I believe the artist meant it to represent, or even or what meaning I perceive. I just know how I feel about it. The forms, colors, textures. scale, and other aspects combine to evoke a positive or negative reaction from me.

I once believed that the fact that I didn't respond positively to most of the abstract art I saw meant that I didn't like abstract art, but over time I've seen quite a bit of it I do like. This sculpture is one f the most recent examples.

[Odin2005]

11. ART!?! That thing is GHASTLY.

[RC]

16. I suppose the 'artist' had to do something with all that junk piling up in the backyard.

[JVS]

15. Is that tail sticking out going to be ok when it has a couple feet of snow on it?

[defendandprotect]

19. Looks more like a weapon than art --

[Obamanaut]

23. self delete

[Book Lover]

24. This article, and the replies in this thread, prove one thing to me

All I see here are knee-jerk "I hate it!"s. How about telling us why you hate it? Can't? That's because you have no training in how to talk about abstract sculpture (or, let's be frank, any type of visual art). If you think an artist grabbed a bunch of crap and crazy glued it all together, you A) are incorrect and B) have been robbed of the arts education you should have gotten.

[SpiralHawk]

25. Ummmm, ahhhh, we hates it because it sucks and stuff like that

Actually, I like it and anything that amends the usual dreary hiwayscape...

[Mimosa]

27. I'm an artist.

I've got training, like all kinds of artistic styles including abstract, know art history and I despise that garbage.

Snobbery is part of what has alienated ordinary people from art.

[msanthrope]

28. How much 'training' does one need to be able to comment on public art?

I note the irony of requiring 'training in how to talk' about tax-payer funded art....it is art for the people, but HOW DARE the people comment on the art provided them by their betters?

Having spent a good deal of my life within regular viewing distance of Paley's "Synergy," having attended Paley's recent retrospective at the Grounds for Sculpture, and having your basic liberal-arts degree and several graduate degrees, I feel as if I might be 'qualified' to opine on this one.


I get why he used the 'ship' metaphor, and I think he's being too clever-clever. Yes, Council Bluffs is the start of the Mormon Trail, and yes, the 'ship' is a metaphor in the mormon religion, and a yes, we 'get' how this is a starting place for many an 'Odyssey.' And yes, there are plenty of statutes commemorating the Trail, and the 'handcart' and the 'covered wagon' and one wants to be innovative....But these ships fall flat---

Instead of being a truly original work, I find them strangely derivative of Arnason's recent Sunship. Further, Paley's interpretation looks less Homeric than Monty-Pythonesque; the ships remind me of set-pieces stolen from Time Bandits.

Not his best.

[Obamanaut]

30. This might be part of the problem - one needs "...training in how to

talk about abstract sculpture..."

One does not need such training to wonder why a local artist rather than one with international renown was chosen.

One does not need such training to imagine how many books could have been bought, or teachers hired, with that $3 million. Or food for the poor, or shelter for the homeless.

And it does look like someone, anyone, did in fact grab a bunch of crap and crazy glue it together.

"But hey, now someone with "training" can talk bad about the untrained ones.

[AngryAmish]

32. Well done, sir.

[Mimosa]

26. Fine example of how to alienate ordinary people from art.

Nothing like putting twisted metal which evokes the look of a junkyard wreck alongside their highway to make people feel positive.

[MilesColtrane]

29. I don't like the combined colors of the source materials.

It does indeed look as though the artist was trying to put five of the most uncomplimentary colors together.

Given the diverse shapes of the piece there's nothing to tie it into a unified whole.

Maybe that's what the artist was going for, but that doesn't jibe with the title "Odyssey".

[rucky]

31. That would be pretty cool in a different setting.

But I don't think commuters really want the intended feelings it provokes.

[ThomThom]

35. like what they might look like if they crash while looking at it

I like it but a different location would be better. Who can appreciate art at 65 mph, only Americans.

[NuttyFluffers]

33. abstract is well over 60 years old & been de rigueur for public works for decades.

and, the greater cardinal sin, far too much of it is sloppy and uninspiring. gov't counsels for public architecture & public sculpture needs to get over themselves -- this noise is old, common as dirt, and everyone sees through the pretension.

i'd dare half the gov't counsels that OK these slipshod, vacuous, self-congratulatory works if they can even name any truly scene changing abstract sculptors/architects past the latter half of the 1960s.

i like abstract art. but i also have high standards and like variety, too.

[MineralMan]

36. I thought it was just the latest cell phone antenna technology.

Now, I find out it's art. Who knew?

[xor]

37. teehee

[Arkansas Granny]

38. I like it, but I can see that it would be a distraction to drivers. There's a lot to look at.

[WhiteTara]

39. it has the feel of a pirate ship

running as fast as it can into the 22nd century...forget this one!

[704wipes]

40. eh, stick a few microwave nodes on it for cell phone transmission

and tell them they will get better coverage on their cell phones, and all the penny ante critics will be fine with it.