Art and the Census?

Artist Anita Glesta is not new to public art projects - she specializes in creating large-scale, international public art projects with particular focus on historical events. She created the site-specific Yurong Water Gardens project in downtown Sydney, Australia in 1994 and later created Pedazos, a response to 9/11, in the open-air courtyard at Black & White Gallery in Williamsburg. 

Glesta has been commissioned by the U.S. General Services Administration's Art in Architecture Program (GSA) to create The Census Project at the U.S. Census Bureau Headquarters in nearby Suitland, MD.

The new project covers more than seven acres and attempts to humanize the data and numbers of the census by drawing attention to the history of numbers and the diversity of people in the U.S. It is partly political and partly seductive, equipped with a winding path and a series of reliefs playfully disrupting concepts of order and categorization. Aerial views show oversized numbers created as areas for seating and congregation.

Like her other public work, the Census Project explores the integration of the physical and the social using sculpture and landscaping to create a connection between people and the land. This is obvious in her details, which showcase a variety of numerical systems, including Native American and Asian values. Apparently Glesta did extensive historical research for the project to gain this global perspective. For example, she discovered that the first censuses of the Sioux Indians required participants to take bundles of sticks to indicate the sizes of their families. This kind of information allowed Glesta to include both traditional numerical symbols as well as the mystical elements usually tied to them from their ancestors. The result? A mystical, yet accessible environment that connects audiences to the numbers and the physical, living space.

Glesta explains: “This project is a mediation on the notion of counting and order with a global perspective.”

The Census Project will be inaugurated on July 12 at the U.S. Census Bureau in Suitland, MD.

Go HERE for more about Anita Glesta.
Go HERE for more about the GSA Art in Architecture Program.

The Census Project can be seen by appointment only. Contact Christine Ewing, NCR Regional Fine Arts Officer, to make an appointment.