Comment on Denver airport officials want to remove the C Concourse’s Interior Garden, but arts advocates cry foul

Denver airport officials want to remove the C Concourse’s Interior Garden, but arts advocates cry foul

Disputes over public art are, by their very nature, out in the open. That’s a good thing for taxpayers, who often have a stake in the financial and cultural outcomes. But these disputes also shed light on the gray-area wrangling that happens when a revenue-conscious organization struggles to free itself from a city-led agreement. In the most high-profile art dispute in its history, Denver International Airport officials have recently butted heads with the city’s public-art program and the cultural commission charged with guiding it over an installation at the 22-year-old airport — the birthplace of Denver’s nationally recognized public-art program, with 36 pieces representing an investment of more than $14 million. At stake: the renowned, highly visible Interior Garden by artist Michael Singer, which the airport wants removed from its C Concourse. Airport officials have said the piece, designed to look like ancient ruins with living tropical plants, is prohibitively expensive to maintain, has not lived up to expectations due “faults in the design” and takes up otherwise valuable space in a concourse they estimate is squeezed by about 50,000 square feet. Some arts advocates are alarmed by that, calling Interior Garden a significant piece of the city’s artistic identity that needs to be preserved.

 

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