Five Points Park

𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗷𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝘂𝗽𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗲:
The Engineered Artworks team in Richmond, CA are busy fabricating their 15’x23′ stainless-steel public art installation for Five Points Park. The sculpture will simulate growing grass blades and form an open canopy over the pathway at the southeast entrance to the park. The interior blades will be highly polished to mirror objects as they pass by. Lighting will provide visibility from the street at night.

Anticipated installation date: April 2024

“My practice is the development and installation of immersive, site-responsive public sculpture, creating imaginative and activated shared places in all kinds of contexts and topographies. I am inspired by early and mid- 20th century design and the aesthetics of locomotion and scientific innovation, and my work is executed primarily in fabricated steel, frequently paired with embedded LEDs or other forms of illumination. In my work, playful engagement with science, technology, and innovation serves as a compelling means to access imaginative contemplation and moments of shared experience among diverse audiences.

I am the founder of Engineered Artworks, a design/build studio specializing in public art, and Five TonCrane, a San Francisco Bay Area artist collective that completes massive sculptures in an intensely collaborative process. Community artmaking is at the center of my work as an artist, and ensuring that diverse neighborhood representatives–from local youth to regional artisans to municipal employees–have their ideas and opinions heard in an artist-initiated process of community engagement is a value that I bring to the Five Points Park project. As a master fabricator with extensive experience in structural design and project management, I also ensure that the public artwork for this site is being implemented in a safe, durable, and efficient manner, on budget and within scheduling and structural parameters.

Raygun Gothic Rocketship, a collaborative piece that I implemented as Lead Artist in collaboration with the Five Ton Crane arts collective, was installed from 2010-2013 at Pier 14 on the San Francisco Embarcadero, during which time it was featured in publications such as Wired, Popular Mechanics, and the Wall Street Journal. In 2017 the piece was permanently installed at the Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum in Denver. This piece, with its iconic stature and retro-futuristic style, is representative of an aesthetic approach, much like the project I have designed for Five Points Park: An illuminated beacon-like sculpture that references the proportions of the surrounding cityscape while also providing an engaging, pedestrian-scaled place for urban contemplation and spontaneous flights of fancy” says Sean Orlando.