The
Kaldor Public Art Projects have a 40 year history of bringing progressive artistic works into the public sphere. As a not-for-profit organisation, Kaldor Public Art projects seek to contribute to the Australian cultural landscape physically through striking installation works, and metaphorically through the education and development of young people.
January 2011 marks the 23rd Kaldor Public Art Project. This even will see John Baldessari bringing his unique brand of conceptual art to the streets of Sydney.
Your Name In Lights" will run from 8 to 30 January at the
Australian Museum's William Street facade.
The project,
according to the Museum, "reflects the changing cult of celebrity in modern society and recalls Andy Warhol's preduction that, in the future, everyone will have their 15 minutes of fame."
In this way, the artist will appropriate the bright lights of Broadway and Hollywood for all passers-by to admire. What is unique about the project, however, is that the names that will be up in lights belong to Sydney-siders who
register.
For 15 seconds, the names of more than 100,000 people will adorn the side of the Australian Museum, at no cost, other than the time it takes to fill in your first and last name, your suburb, and an email address.
This initiative is just the most recent example of American John Baldessari's prolific works combining text and image in order to underline compelling aspects of the social order. The conceptual work will be just one way in which the city is transformed in the course of the
Sydney Festival.
