Philadelphia's Mural Arts Program Goes Interactive With Its Newest Artworks
by Paul Kurtz
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- The city's renowned Mural Arts Program is working with fourteen well-known artists on a series of works that interract with the viewing public.
Today at Paine's Park, the skate park in the shadow of the art museum, skateboarders were giving two new sculptures a workout -- exactly as the artist had intended.
These are the first of 14 so-called "open source" projects that will be appearing in Philadelphia over the next four months.
Mural Arts Program executive director Jane Golden calls the exhibition a "bold redefinition" of contemporary art.
"It'll be unlike anything done before, and we expect people to come from all over the world," she said.
Pedro Alonzo, the program's curator, says they asked the artists to create works that would be as participatory as possible.
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For example, Alonzo says, "the artist MoMo will be developing a methodology for painting which he will teach to kids: how to paint using this very defined technique. They're going to paint a mural together in North Philly, and then the kids will teach the public how to use the methodology. So it becomes a self-replicating system."
Open Source concludes with a monthlong celebration in October.
