The Moscow Metro stations built in the 1930s are original monuments of modern architecture richly decorated in marble, stainless steel, and intricate mosaics and stained glass, which have no equal in the West. They represent images and ideas, which have lost their meaning through the deStalinisation process and the Cold War, G rin says. Canadian public art also provides many examples of how art is transformed as the cultural context changes, G rin says. While modern public art in Canada is mostly abstract, it too has political undertones that often go unrecognized just a few years after works of art have been placed in the public sphere. Art standing in our streets is not neutralized by museums which shape the viewer's experience.
Canadian citizens interact with public art on a daily basis.
Its cultural and political role changes because it is influenced by everything around it - the media, other buildings, and even the people walking around it. I'm trying to help us understand how visual culture has a broad impact on national identity. I want to put the politics and meaning back into the art we see everyday. Copyright 1995, University of Regina. All rights reserved.