On April 24, 2020, we hosted our fourth N+T Asks conversation. This week Assistant Curator Leah Triplett Harrington asked you and our guests Stephanie Cardon and Charla Jones, "How does art offer hope to artists and the public?" Click to watch or listen to the full conversation.

On April 17, 2020, we welcomed artist and curator Rachel Allen, social change designer and founder of DS4SI, Kenny Bailey, and over 80 of you into a conversation exploring the question: “What can artists do right now?”

We were glad to have special guests artist Stephen Hamilton (2018 Public Art Accelerator and creator of The Founders Project) and Tiffany Cogell, a driven advocate and community organizer (and one of the powerful women featured in Elisa Hamilton’s 2017 project Slideshow) join us for our second installment of N+T Asks and help us answer: “What does care mean right now?”

On April 3, 2020, we launched our new online conversation series "N+T Asks." We were excited to welcome artist Silvia Lopez Chavez, Program Director of Public Art at New England Foundation for the Arts, Kim Szeto, and more than 75 participants from across the cultural sector as we asked: “What does public mean right now?”

We’re thrilled to introduce our powerhouse keynote speaker for the Now + There Forum: Public Art Accelerator, Dr. Kymberly Pinder! A public art curator with decades of experience with community-oriented and ephemeral public art projects, Dr. Pinder was named the Provost and Senior Vice President of MassArt in 2019.

Lori Lobenstine, Program Design Lead with DS4SI joins us on the blog to talk about the impact of public making and how projects like Augment support social intervention and collective agency.

New space, a growing team, and more commitment than ever to our #publicartcity.

We’re partnering with Arts Connect International to sponsor the 2019 Arts Equity Summit and present a panel “Loop-breaking: creating a virtuous cycle of public art production” to consider the challenges of creating truly community-oriented artworks and discuss barriers to entry for public art artists and audiences alike.

Public art reflects the value of equity in a town or city for all its members to be able to access contemporary art. I believe most artists, by nature, are cultural producers, hoping to share ideas, perspectives and curiosity. Interacting with art is an important social and personal experience and when shared publicly, has limitless impact.

UNLESS is meant to bring us together to confront the realities of climate change and our role in it, individually and collectively.

Here’s to our volunteers! As the volunteer coordinator for Patterned Behavior, I met over thirty hardworking and passionate people whose help was vital in making our project a reality. They painted, primed, greeted, and directed traffic for over two weeks, and everyone who came out brought their own unique perspective and enthusiasm to the site.

Now playing: Public Trust, the documentary by RAVA Films, featuring artist Paul Ramirez Jonas and many of the people behind it—including participants like you!

2017 is starting strong with some great artist-in-residence opportunities here in the Boston area and further afield. Seeking more experience in public policy, creative placemaking, working with elementary-age students, or immigrant communities? Looking to deepen your socially engaged practice? Keep reading

Site-specific public art is the lens through which we experience common spaces and grow as a community. In 2017, Chicago is celebrating a Year of Public Art by funding permanent and temporary works, performances, education, and gatherings to promote civic discourse through art. Here's how we think Boston can—must!—have a Year of Public Art.

The quantitative impacts of an artwork—especially a free, temporary, artwork visiting multiple sites like Public Trust—can be challenging to measure. But tracking who interacts with our work is necessary not just to secure funding or media coverage.

A month after Public Trust closed in Copley Square, we asked participants to submit their stories about how they're keeping and living with their promises today. Here are your Public Trust stories: to forgive, to visit, to speak up, and to believe.

How have the words you spoke at Public Trust with Paul Ramirez Jonas taken up residence in your life? Reflections one month out and an invitation to share your story about how making a promise, and making it public, has inspired you to take action and live more bravely. (Plus win a gift certificate to get your promise framed!)

Five artists, curators and instigators answer the question: "Who is your practice for?" and their answers are as complex and generous as their work. With Che Anderson, Jennie Carlise, William Chambers, Elisa Hamilton, and Lori Lobenstine.

From loving more to being champions, children gave us their promises during a Public Trust preview at Summer Paint Nights with Center for Art and Community Partnerships' (CACP) spark! ArtMobile and Project R.I.G.H.T.

Evaluating the impact of public art is the Achilles heel of artists and public art administrators worldwide. Instinctively we know that public art is a catalyst for economic development, that it increases the appeal and safety of one’s environment, and that it delivers unexpected surprise and wonder to our shared places.  In this blog we offer three techniques for measuring impact and ask, is it even needed?

Boston was spared this winter and our fair City of People, Places and Things (to borrow a term) is coming alive with public art opportunities. Check out our top picks for artists, designers and mer-people alike.