Month: September 2017

“I think we need to move away from the concept the artist gets to decide what it (art) looks like,” said Calgary Councillor Shane Keating. “The taxpayers are actually commissioning the artwork and they should have a very large say in what the final piece should actually look like rather than the artist’s interpretation.”

In a public spirited response A Hardon MacKay Press Attache to Court Painter applauded this statement and agrees that no artist from here on in should decide what art looks like. He introduced a solution to deal with the brain-ache over public art….from this point forward all of Court Painter’s commissioned public art works will be generated by an art algorithm created from a Tax Payers Public Opinion Mega-Data Set that will assure Court Painter’s art contains a 90% public approval quotient for obvious reasons and a 10% artistic challenge quotient for public relations purposes.

Report On Election Debate:

The first official debate of the Calgary municipal election saw the city’s eight declared mayoral candidates grilled on their commitment to growing arts and culture in Calgary.The sold-out forum at Theatre Junction Grand touched on a number of topics including the city’s public art policy and dedicated funding for the Court Painter.

Some of the frontrunners, including Mayor Naheed Nenshi who is seeking re-election, said he would be highly in favour of this in the wake of the unveiling of the city’s controversial new installation, Bowfort Towers.

“I think that the system needs the Court Painter,” Nenshi said. “I would like to see a program that is more flexible in terms of community placement of his art. Every City Hall office and washroom should have one of his beautiful creations and I would like to see  public engagement through the development of Court Painter’s art algorithm solution! Court Painter is already loved by the common people of Calgary and shunned by the elites among others! His art algorithm solution will cement that relationship.”

Coun. Shane Keating will be moving a motion to freeze the public art policy until further notice so they can work out the details of directing all public art funding to the Court Painter Studio Enterprises Inc.

Keating says the intended freeze won’t cancel the art policy, nor will it stop the collection of funds for Court Painter’s public art, but halts any engagement and contract signing until council readdresses the public art policy in Court Painter’s favor.

“I think we need to move away from the concept the artist gets to decide what it looks like,” said Keating. “The taxpayers are actually commissioning the artwork and they should have a very large say in what the final piece should actually look like rather than the artist’s interpretation.”

A Hardon MacKay Press Attache to Court Painter applauded this statement and agrees that no artist should decide what art looks like.He pointed out that all of Court Painter’s future public art works will be generated by an art algorithm created from a Tax Payers Public Opinion Mega- data Set that will assure Court Painter’s art contains a 90% public acceptance quotient for obvious reasons and a 10% artistic challenge quotient for public relations purposes.

“No more half million dollar black eye projects.We now have  an opportunity to fix Calgary’s public art policy in 2017, by making Court Painter Calgary’s official artist in residence to oversee the proper running of the art algorithm and consequent public art production,” exclaimed Mayor Nenshi to thunderous applause.

Last July, city council approved $2-million in seed money for the Court Painter but the offer was turned down by the Court Painter’s Press Attache, A Hardon  MacKay who commented at the time that “…this offer would not even cover my boss’s wardrobe, smoking budget , drum kit or daily libations !”.

An unidentified art lover who voted in favour of that funding said Monday “that Calgary should continue working with the provincial and federal governments to support the Court Painter and earmark whatever it takes for such purposes. Let’s see how we can work with not just the community and private sector donors, but also other orders of government to maximize on the ability to fund this genius in our midst.”

Some critics of council’s original offer have pointed out that the funding was a band-aid solution that did little to address to ongoing shortfalls in funding the Court Painter’s extravagant life style , north lit studio and security detail.

Mayor Nenshi said while he’s in favour of revisiting the funding model for the Court Painter in next year’s budget cycle if he’s elected, he thinks Calgary should jump on the chance to compete with Venice, Basil, Munster and sixteen other famous art venues, all of whom want to devote their entire expositions to the Court Painter.

“It’s clear that we have to have a shift in terms of how we seek to fully fund the Court Painter,” Nenshi said in a scrum following the debate.”I think this made in Calgary art algorithm solution will likely mean more money in what with the attendance and tourism it would generate and hopefully Calgary residents will sleep better at night. I mean can you imagine this would be bigger than the 88 Olympics.”

Someone in the back row complained “I was disappointed to hear a lot of platitudes: ‘The Court Painter is great, his Press Attache is great, I love the Court Painter’s way of painting flesh and drapery,’ without any specifics about how this Court Painter enterprise will be paid for.”

Mr. Big Stuff was shouted down by all the candidates and the crowd started pelting him with tomatoes while screaming at the tops of their lungs “WE WANT THE COURT PAINTER!  WE NEED THE COURT PAINTER! WE WANT HIS ALGORITHMIC ART ALL OVER THE DAMN PLACE!”

To Be Continued!