Temporary art program can leave a lasting impression, Yazzy's at www.williamverdult.com

According to San Diego.com, Back in 1984, the Port of San Diego installed a sculpture that is austere in appearance but intriguingly suited to its site, Chula Vista's Bayside Park. “Conoids,” as it's called, is by Carlsbad sculptor Kenneth Capps and it's something of an anomaly among permanent works installed by the Port of San Diego. Its collection leans heavily toward conventional cast versions of everything from fishermen to birds to surfers.

The problem with this category of figurative sculptures is that they cater to some vague notion of popular imagery. But mostly they are dull and inconsequential.

The sculpture by Capps, it's worth noting, was installed before two works for port sites were proposed in the 1980s, spurring controversy; neither was realized. The prospective artists were Americans with broad international reputations: Ellsworth Kelly and Vito Acconci. And while Capps wasn't as widely known, his art shares a similar ambitiousness in style and medium.

This kind of ambitiousness, in the port's program, mostly evaporated along with the proposed works by Kelly and Acconci. And even when a big-scale proposal surfaced again in 2003 – courtesy of San Diego artist A. Wasil, with his idea for an immense fountain with a kitschy Neptune and cute dolphins, done in a baroque vein – it was a work that embraced bad taste without the slightest degree of irony.

Then, in 2004, something unexpected happened. A work by a major American sculptor, Mark di Suvero, surfaced on a Port of San Diego site, a traffic median at Laurel Street and Harbor Drive. And while “Isis” lacks the muscular power of di Suvero's best sculptures, it is nonetheless a monumental-scale work by an artist of note.

The sculpture's local appearance signaled a welcome development that has continued with the installation of two works. Dennis Oppenheim's “Engagement” recently emerged on the traffic island formerly occupied by “Isis.” And in the last week, Magdalena Abakanowicz's 9-foot-tall cast-iron “Walking Figures,” 18 of them, have come to occupy a spot along Harbor Drive, on land bordered by Petco Park on the east and the San Diego Convention Center on the west.

Di Suvero's massive construction marked the return of internationally recognized artists under the port's banner, and the appearance of Oppenheim's and Abakanowicz's art furthers that trend. None of them was – or is – permanent, either: Di Suvero's piece was scheduled for one year, though it remained in place for three. The Abakanowicz is scheduled for a one-year stay, just like the Oppenheim.

There is another important thing these works share. They were selected and brought here through a partnership between the Port of San Diego's Public Art Program and San Diego's Commission for Arts and Culture. It was established back in 2004, when Lynda Forsha was the commission's public art program administrator. Dana Springs, who succeeded Forsha in that role, believes just as strongly in that partnership. Catherine Sass, the director of the port's public art program since 1996, is the constant.

“It facilitates having a variety of art in the everyday environment,” says Sass.

“This allows us to have something that is dynamic and changing. How could that be bad?” says Springs.

It's a winning situation for the city and the port. Much of the impetus for the current pair of works originated with members of a joint selection committee provided by the city: Mary Beebe, director of the the Stuart Collection on the UCSD campus, and Michael Krichman, co-director of inSITE, the binational exhibition that periodically fills San Diego and Tijuana sites.

At the same time, the Port of San Diego has overseen the challenges of getting these works installed, with its relatively new public art project manager, Yvonne Wise, guiding the process.

Then, there's the cost. The city's public art budget is small right now, explains Springs. There simply wouldn't be the funds to bring big works by high-profile artists to town. The port is able to do so, providing the $150,000 needed for each sculpture. It also provided the installation costs: $11,000 for “Engagement” and $10,000 for “Walking Figures.”

Ongoing debate

There is debate among the ranks of the port commissioners, Sass acknowledges, about the worth of funding the installation of this kind of temporary art. This issue was raised in a recent workshop that involved the commissioners, port art staff like Sass and others in the community. It's part of an ongoing evaluation process of the program that will produce a report in January. At least until then, new proposals for permanent works are on hold.

At that workshop, Sass made the argument, in a PowerPoint presentation, that “by investing a percentage of our public art budget toward these leases, we are elevating our reputation as a key player in the international arts community.”

“Key player” is an exaggeration. But there's no question that bringing works by artists like Oppenheim and Abakanowicz to town can create vital buzz for a city – and for both art programs.

Far more than the city of San Diego's program, however, the port's has generated divided opinion going back to the days of the aborted Kelly and Acconci commissions. The Wasil project was a prime example.

Early this year, the port generated a controversy once again by bringing J. Seward Johnson's bizarre 25-foot-tall sculptural parody of Alfred Eisenstaedt's celebrated picture “V-J Day at Times Square” (1945) to the downtown waterfront. The towering “Unconditional Surrender” puts some people in the mood to imitate the sculpture, kidding for the camera, and makes others grimace.

In terms of reputation, this sculpture has likely done some damage. But it demonstrates one virtue of temporary public art: When it's bad, you know it's destined to leave town.

“Engagement” and “Walking Figures” are the badly needed antidotes. We can hope they'll stay longer. While Johnson's figures are poorly made and lack any sense of humanity, Abakanowicz's cast-iron “people” are riveting because of their beautifully textured surfaces, their structure and their power as a group.

They convey stark dignity, with their legs striding forward, as if they are a band of refugees on the move. Their lack of heads is haunting, and it also lends them a more archetypal demeanor.

The site, bordering Harbor Drive, has the effect of making the figures look as if they are about to cross the road, determined to get somewhere. They aren't necessarily apocalyptic, but their starkness shares something of the tone of Cormac McCarthy's most recent novel, “The Road,” with its odyssey through a ruined world.

You need not know Abakanowicz's biography to appreciate her work. But she knows something about ruined worlds, having endured the Nazi occupation of her native Poland.

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