Posted on 03/16/2006 3:26:17 PM PST by NewHampshireDuo
The Portland City Council will have to ignore the recommendation of citizen advisers if it wants to accept a controversial gift of bronze statues from Portland Sea Dogs owner Daniel Burke.
The Public Art Committee, an advisory group appointed by the council, voted 6-1 Wednesday to recommend that the council reject the statues, which depict a traditional family of four going to a baseball game. The vote came after Burke's attorney said no changes will be made to the sculptures.
The statues generated heated public debate during the last week as issues of government intervention and family diversity clashed with the passions associated with America's favorite pastime.
Committee members said the statues would be too large for their intended location, on the sidewalk outside Hadlock Field, and that they would violate the city's ban on public art that includes commercial advertising. The boy figure wears a hat and a shirt with Sea Dogs logos.
Committee members also noted that Burke and the artist, Rhoda Sherbell, failed to seek guidance from the committee long before the sculptures were completed, which is required by city ordinance. They said most artists and donors of public art know that cities have rules governing how it should be designed, displayed and maintained.
"It's an awful big assumption that you can create something and give it to the city and expect them to accept it," said committee member Lauren Silverson, who voted against Burke's gift along with Peggy Golden, Richard Renner, Jack Soley, David Wade and Jay York.
Stephen Halpert offered the sole vote to accept the gift, though he agreed with committee members' concerns.
"I felt, all in all, I wanted to lean toward acceptance despite having many more reasons against it," Halpert said after the meeting.
Burke's attorney, William Troubh, said the Sea Dogs logo reflects what many baseball fans wear to the stadium on Park Avenue. While committee members said they wanted "timeless" art and questioned how long the Sea Dogs would be in Portland, Troubh said the logo would provide historical interest in the future.
Regarding the statues' size, Troubh clarified that the father figure is 9 feet tall, including a 1-foot pedestal, not 11 feet tall, as he previously told the committee. Still, Troubh said, the sculptures are "97 percent done" and can't be changed without violating the concept and integrity of the artist's work.
"It is finished," Troubh said. "It cannot and will not be changed."
Troubh tried to discuss the committee's concern, expressed at an earlier meeting, that the statues fail to reflect Portland's growing diversity, both in its people and its artwork. Portland has significant minority, single-parent and gay-parent households, and committee members have said they want fewer statues of white people.
Jack Soley, committee vice chairman, said that concern wouldn't figure in the panel's recommendation.
After the vote, Troubh said he was disappointed but not surprised by the committee's decision. He said he hopes the council will disregard the committee's recommendation when it votes on Burke's gift, perhaps as early as Monday.
"If the council says no, the owner will look at different options," Troubh said. "But it's difficult for me to think the council will say no."
Councilor Karen Geraghty, a committee member who didn't vote on the recommendation, tried to "heal hurt feelings on either side." She said the committee was right to expect people to seek guidance before offering gifts of public art, and it was understandable that Burke and Sherbell didn't know the city has a review process for such gifts.
She also said the city's guidelines for accepting gifts of public art are unclear and should be defined.
Councilor William Gorham, who attended the committee meeting, said he plans to vote in favor of Burke's gift. "I think it will look great at the ballpark," Gorham said outside City Hall. "I think this whole thing has been pretty silly."
The only member of the public to speak at the committee's afternoon meeting was John Brett, a Whitney Avenue resident who is a Sea Dogs season-ticket holder.
"The best thing that ever happened to this town is the Sea Dogs," Brett said. "I think this would be an excellent thing to put in front of the ballpark."
So, while the official reason to reject the statue is the fact that it includes a baseball cap with the name of the local team (thereby making the statue "commercial"), the less vocally expressed reason is that the statue presents a good, normal family. Can't have that. Hopefully the art panel will be overruled by the city council.
When the family is your enemy, you have sided with evil.
A "traditional family of four"? Scandalous! Grotesque! Horrendous!
Now if they were nude, piled on top of each other, why then they'd get the green light/extreme sarcasm off
Obviously a statue with more taste would of been chosen. Such as two gay cowboys laying together eating pudding.
I'm sure if it was a statue of Lenin or a gay orgy, it would of been approved.
This is complete bullshit.
I have been to Hadlock field for many a ballgame and this is what the sidewalk in front looks like:
A big frakkin' statue of Slugger the Sea Dog...wearing a Portland Sea Dogs baseball cap.
Time for the committee to try out a different lie.
A family of four is now controversial... Satan surely walks among us.... I guess my family is scandalous!
I've been to a SeaDog game. I eill hazard a guess that the statue, as described, looks like the overwhelming majority of the crowd.
Here's a "can you believe this crap?" ping.
It makes me wonder if they would have accepted the statues if both parents were women?
The statue would have been fine if it had been of a Black father, a white mother with her lesbian girlfriend and two mixed blood children. one with the black father and another with a chinese father from a previous marriage.
Only if it was a black Lenin.
Just like when the Boy Scouts are your enemy, you have sided with evil.
Well said.
I want to design the next statue.
It will be Che Guevara cooking heroin in a spoon for an interracial gay family with an adopted 16 year old gay kid, who will be wearing the Sea Dogs cap.
You mean a previous RELATIONSHIP. :D
Simple solution - just say they are on their way to an anti-war demonstration rather than a ballgame.
It might be art and it might be inspired genius, but if the community thinks it would be more nuisance than inspiration they may reject it.
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