Art outdoors gains its life and its energy from the air. There are particularly fine concentrations of rock art throughout New Mexico . . . especially near Galisteo, outside of Taos and, most spectacularly, on Albuquerque's West Mesa. A modern, urban response to the irrepressible need to convey messages in a public forum is the flourishing presence of graffiti in our cities. More accepted and admired, perhaps, are murals and frescoes painted on community walls.
Public art is art available to everyone.
It willingly subjects itself to all opinions. In Santa Fe, there are literally hundreds of pieces of artwork in public places . . . We asked artists to give us their thoughts about creating outdoor art, about working outdoors or about spaces that are themselves works of art or that are built to contain or display art outdoors. Understandably, a common thread is the weather and a natural world not controllable by human beings and which make their imprint on the artist or the work of art itself. There is an impulse to import art into a natural environment.