Spring seems to have arrived, finally. It's time to get out and enjoy that all-too-brief nice weather in northern Vermont.
That doesn't mean you have to bypass art created by people to enjoy the art of nature. The University of Vermont campus is adding to its public art in a big way, placing thought-provoking works in easy-to-find locations on campus, one that will be busy with visitors for UVM graduation May 20.
UVM's Fleming Museum of Art has a strong permanent collection and notable temporary exhibitions such as the current one celebrating the career of Vermont author/illustrator Alison Bechdel. Public art, though, brings works outside museum walls and onto grounds thousands of people walk daily.
"It's important that we have public art across our campus as people go out and about," said UVM President Tom Sullivan, who has ushered a public-art program onto campus that has seen five new works in the past couple of years. Most of that art is by UVM alumni, including one known for his work with the UVM-born rock band Phish.
UVM has displayed public art for generations, much of it traditional (statues on the university green of university founder Ira Allen and Revolutionary War hero Marquis de Lafayette, who in 1825 laid the cornerstone of the Old Mill building) or self-referential (a Catamount statue near Bailey-Howe Library illustrating the school nickname). The new works join extant pieces that hit the sweet spot between appealing to look at and intriguing to think about.
"University life and education should be about educating and provoking life-long learning and thinking and critical analysis," Sullivan said. "Art and the humanities really help enrich. But we've got to bring it to the people, so to speak."
The Burlington Free Press joined Janie Cohen, director of the Fleming Museum of Art, on a more-or-less clockwise walking tour Monday of that public art. We begin outside the Fleming's front door…
'Primavera'
Nothing says spring like "Primavera," this 2010 sculpture by Dorset native and 1975 UVM alum Richard Erdman that's in front of James Jeffords Hall, which houses the departments of plant biology and plant and soil science. "Primavera" is the Italian word for spring, and Erdman's bronze sculpture depicts what appears to be a plant about to burst out in bloom.
The sculpture is surrounded by a garden designed by a botany student. When the plants flourish this spring, Cohen said, they will reveal colors complementary to the art while lying low enough to not obstruct Erdman's work.
'Arete Blu'
This 2016 piece, also by Richard Erdman, is among UVM's newest acquisitions. The best way to find it after "Flukes" is to go in the Davis Center's third-floor entrance, down to the second floor and to the opposite end of the building onto the student center's "green" roof, where the Brazilian blue-granite work rests.
The mottled-blue sculpture twists its way double-helix-like toward the sky, which on Monday's clear-blue morning made it seem like a natural part of the environment. Cohen noted that the smooth, gleaming textures of Erdman's two works and Gund's "Flukes" create a common, compelling thread. "They're so sensual," she said, "the feeling of them, the smooth surfaces."