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Art Fri Jul 13 2012
These (Art) Moments
When we talk about the Pitchfork Music Festival, we usually talk about the abundance of performers from across the country and globe. Perhaps we mention the heat or the the ongoing mini-events (CHIRP Record Fair, Flatstock) that provide a welcome respite during the long, intensive days spent walking from one end of the park to the next. This year, art installations by Chicago-based Matthew Hoffman and Andrea Jablonski in conjunction with Johalla Projects, aim to frame and entice the experience of festival goers. The Pitchfork Music Festival begins today, July 13, and runs through Sunday, July 15.
After first proposing eight ideas by different artists, Johalla Projects and the Pitchfork Music Festival organizers settled on Hoffman's and Jablonski's uniquely-visible works. Incorporating his frequent use of motivational phrases, Hoffman (who has exhibited with Yes in Cincinnati and Public Works in Chicago) created an 80 ft. sculpture that spells out "THESE MOMENTS."
"My work has a positive, motivational feel to it," Hoffman said. "I look for phrases that can be interpreted in a number of different ways, leaving the viewer to take their own meaning." Hoffman's past work further emphasizes his interest in positive, motivational phrases that provoke while still feeling familiar and universal to a variety of different audiences. For this installation, Hoffman brainstormed a few phrases before "THESE MOMENTS" was chosen as something of a defining phrase for the festival.
"Whenever you're at the festival, you're overtaken by the music and the heat and we wanted people to take the time to look around them," said Johalla Projects Founder/Director Anna Cerniglia. "THESE MOMENTS," a phrase that is affirming for both the individual and the collective, highlights why the Pitchfork Music Festival is so engaging for thousands of fans year after year. The relationship between music and specific moments in time makes the festival experience so powerful. Regardless of one's preferred genre of music, the feelings are translatable from audience to audience. It is the memories that resonate long after the festival has ended.
Although Jablonski's (who has created public art works for Cows on Parade and within Grant Park) installation will be situated within the VIP area of the festival, non-VIP attendees will still be able to view parts of the work from far away. Comprised of thousands of balloons of different sizes, shapes, colors, and structures, Jablonski's colorful installation was created to match the audio part of the festival, while still respecting the park outside of this weekend. "We wanted to do something that wouldn't affect the natural landscape," she said. The work is temporary and disposable, without a huge environmental impact.
Like Hoffman's work, Jablonski wanted to ensure that the work could be seen in the general area and from far away. Rather than conforming to the exclusivity of the VIP, the work provides a beautifully-whimsical visual. The best way to work with a medium like balloons or a massive installation usually involves four walls. But public art emphasizes the value in what is not always sought out or seen. "I like environments that are not really conducive to these works," Cerniglia said. "And yet, why shouldn't these works be there in the first place?"
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Time-lapse video of the installation of "THESE MOMENTS" featuring "Future City" by Heavy Times: