Pedestrian

Conceived and executed as part of the Regional Arts & Culture Council’s In Situ Portland project, Pedestrian is now a part of Portland Community College’s (Sylvania Campus) public art collection. Pedestrian seeks to explore the place bridges occupy in our common symbolic vocabulary, and suggest the bridge as an expression of human will: the accumulation and transformation of many small objects into a larger, coherent form and ultimately into a method of conveyance. Like any sculpture, Pedestrian is meant to be contemplated, but it is also meant to be used: it begs to be touched, sat upon and contemplated from. Pedestrian was intended to be in conversation with Portland’s modern steel and concrete bridges. In the context of PCC it is also a metaphor suggesting the intellectual, physical, and emotional bridges forged by students, faculty, staff and community.

Pedestrian: Installation view, River Overlook Park
2000
0 x 0 x 0
Slate, reinforced concrete
Collection of Portland Community College, Sylvania Campus

View showing the piece in its original location: River Overlook Park on the east bank of the Willamette River.

Pedestrian: Installation documentation, River Overlook Park
2000
10" x 8"
Gelatin silver print

Documentary photograph showing Chappell Trucking installing Pedestrian at River Overlook Park. I'm still struck by how light the form seems when it's not connected with the ground.

Pedestrian (Detail)
2000
0 x 0 x 0
Slate, reinforced concrete
Collection of Portland Community College, Sylvania Campus

Study for Pedestrian
1999
0 x 0
Graphite on paper
Collection of John and Heidi McIsaac

Very preliminary conceptual drawing, predating the small sculpture shown in Courier