Artwork takes to scaffolding

New York City has about a million feet of construction scaffolding at any given time, and artists are being invited to use it as a canvas to showcase their craft.

Artists submit their work to an expert panel that chooses which to display at construction sites throughout the city.

"Art has the power to inspire kids -- to make the difference between picking up a gun or picking up a paintbrush," said Linda Harris, a retired city bus driver who stopped at an installation in Brooklyn's East Flatbush neighborhood on a hot August day.

Eight artists' works grace plywood fencing around an apartment building going up for special needs and low-income families.

Graffiti or street art this is not.

The project is run by ArtBridge, a nonprofit that is trying to mount high-level art on streets. Advisers have included artists and curators from such world-class institutions as the Guggenheim Museum, Parsons School of Design and the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

"We strive to show the kind of art one might expect to find in a gallery or contemporary museum," said Jordana Zeldin, ArtBridge's director and curator, who oversees the organization's gallery and studio in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood.

About a half-dozen installations have been made in New York City. They cost $5,000 to $30,000 each, depending on location, scope and size.

Other art adorns scaffolding in Brooklyn's Dumbo, a redeveloped neighborhood of galleries and boutiques.

There, a work by Yugoslav-born New York resident Aleksandar Macasev spans 306 linear feet of scaffolding. Called "ChromaTweet," stripes of color represent his moods on any given day during a two-year emotional journey, as recorded in his blog-turned-social-network.

ArtBridge is partnering with a handful of big New York developers to expand the program -- in the city and to upstate Kingston, which is sprinkled with artists.

Rodney Durso, an artist who teaches at Parsons and founded ArtBridge in 2008, is also speaking with community advocates in L'Aquila, Italy, where much of the city's downtown is in scaffolding, following a 2009 earthquake.

And artists and architects in Christchurch, New Zealand, are in touch with ArtBridge for possible projects there, Durso said. A magnitude 6.1 quake struck there in 2011, killing 185 people and destroying 1,400 downtown buildings.

Funding for ArtBridge installations comes from private donors, developers and businesses that donate goods and services such as paint and printing. United Hoisting & Scaffolding, one of the largest New York companies in the business, installs the art at cost.

"Our goal is to get up-and-coming artists exposure for their work," Durso said. At least a dozen scaffold projects are expected to be on display in New York City by early 2013, he said. Chosen artists receive a stipend of up to $100.

Each work is photographed and transferred to a computer, then printed on weatherproof vinyl that lasts outdoors for up to a year.

The next installation is scheduled to go up at a yet-unspecified New York location in October.

When the scaffolding comes down, homeless or unemployed women turn the artsy vinyl into tote bags, which are sold for $55 each online and at the Chelsea studio. About 200 have been purchased. Proceeds benefit the women and ArtBridge.

"If my art were to be a tote being sold at a department store, I'd feel terrible, but I feel wonderful that it's going to a community in need," says artist Cecilia Schmidt, whose "Point of View" in East Flatbush depicts white birds flying high over the Earth.

"There's another way to look at ourselves and the world," she says. "This is a bird's-eye view of Earth."