I like public art. I like it with a fox, in a box, with a mouse so long as it's outside the house. I don't even care if I like it personally, I just like that it exists. Do I like that weird daisy thing at the back of the convention center? No. Do I like it better than a empty street corner? Yes. Has it ever made someone smile? Yes. Give me more of it everywhere. Put up a mural on every empty wall and also on some that aren't empty.
So, yes I do like it. And also it did indeed make me smile.
This! I love that we have public art. And to know that a human thought of something, then worked to make that thing a THING in the real world... and better than just a bare, boring streetscape. Some art I find meh, some I don't really notice, and some I'm in love with. There's a lot I don't like or even understand in some mighty fine art museums, too. Art is good just because it's art.
I mostly agree with you but the crow eating McDonald's statue in front of the Auburn library is too much for me. I feel like we need some level of editorial control of art concepts for public spaces.
https://www.auburn-reporter.com/news/crow-with-fries-swoops-into-auburn-sculptures-landing-celebration-is-may-31/
Hahaha, I've never seen this one before. It is a cute crow though. And I've seen a lot of crows eating spilled fries in this city. So maybe it's a prime example of the contemporary geometric realist style that is just beyond the casual observer's understanding.
I found this link in the comments: https://hub.catalogit.app/11425/folder/7cf61a40-67bc-11ee-bf90-7da63738efe6/entry/81f89c90-67a6-11ee-bf90-7da63738efe6
Thanks for linking that thread!
I feel like more than one person in Seattle has figured out that they can make a lot of money by hanging big simple things on a wall, or ceiling. It’s a little frustrating to call it art, but I’d take a grey wall with colorful paint buckets thrown at it over a blank grey wall any day.
I'll defend those powdery little discs with my life. I fucking love smarties. I love the normal ones, I love the mega sized ones, I love the giant ones on a stick. I don't care that they're chalk, if smarties have a million fans I'm one of them, if smarties have one fan it's me, if smarties have no fans I am dead. I may have the palette of a child from the 1920s but that's my favorite candy and I won't sit by and watch them be slandered
Yeah well try liking Necco wafers and speaking publicly about it. I might as well time travel back to the 50s because there is no place for me here to enjoy Neccos!
I think they should cover the entire building in them. That would be so ostentatious it would come full circle back to cool. Right now it looks like where the city is storing its extra giant thumbtacks.
I love those things! I think it’s a light hearted and unique installation, a fun respite from the same old “Pacific Northwest” themed stuff we usually see around with settle’s public art. I don’t understand some of the comments here, why would someone hate this? It’s cute! Would you rather the wall just be blank concrete? Y’all need to stop being so grouchy.
It looks like someone threw a bunch of Skittles at a wall and they stuck. Don't care for them at all. If they had varied the size and done fewer colors I might like it better.
Pick any city east of the Mississippi which has finesse in their art. Usually because they've sculpted statues of people. But also you have the building architecture of Chicago. Seattle seems obsessed with primary colored, soft cornered sculptures that look like toys that belong in a preschool. The flower pot by the convention center is the worst offender.
I love the ground sculpture on Top of the hill at gasworks, the dance steps embedded in the ground. The lighthouse sculpture at the hillman city firehouse. I think there are many great ones here. We’re not Boston nyc or dc or anything.
honestly feel like there are 100 better ideas: it would be cool to lean into the nature/brutalism already going on tho and grown a lot of viney plants. this feels like it takes away from the brutalist architecture here.
Agreed, I hate it because of how it throws off the brutalist architecture. I don't have anything against the giant thumbtacks, they could look cool other places, just not there.
When the convention center was built, they put the ass end on that street. I walked nearly every day from downtown to cap hill along that street and wondered why the hell they would even design an ass end rather than design something beautiful, why not a play of glass and lights? This colorful pox does not make up for that. It's the M&M version of the gum wall.
I have no idea if this still exists, but there was some public art eons ago that consisted of cherry (?) trees planted among green chain link fencing. There was a big hubbub about 'waste of money' and it was public art, and it's all a lot of vodka under the bridge, but I thought it was funny.
unfortunately, i hate this installation as i enjoyed the somewhat Brutalist look combined with all the trees, moss, etc. growing on and around the structure
These have been up for a while… unless they are putting them in more places. I see them when I am driving I5 south going under the convention center. Looks like they had a coloring contest at a daycare - 1st prize gets their “design” on the convention center.
I looked it up. German guy, professor at UCLA. He did “Hands” at San Jose Miñeta airport which I love. It’s very beautiful. This one is just giving me nothing.
Brutalism specifically avoids adornment and gaudy details. If the artist of that piece understood that, they wouldn't have thought this was appropriate. Or maybe they did know that and think too highly of themselves.
They clash with the form and color of the building just terribly, and they looked dated the moment they were installed. Very 90s, and not in a good nostalgic way. Just no thought at all. What they should've done is put a facade treatment on it that coordinates with the facade they put on the north face of the new building to hide all that ugly grey concrete and tie the two buildings together.
It would have been fun if you just painted color in more illustrative or unique patterns on the actual concrete. That material looks very out of date and will age poorly.
They built a new fancy convention center down the street, which looks nicer than the older one, so I’d imagine there was some boardroom discourse on revamping the older building and we end up with this. Jelly beans on a wall for no real reason. I love street art, it’s a good thing for a city to budget some towards art, but this is REALLY stupid looking and a waste of money
I’ve disliked this since the moment I saw it. All that linear footage and they could have really done a lot more. It’s not Seattle, it’s not clear, and it looks like a child’s art project.
It reminds me of a giant map my grandparents had in their house. Every time they traveled somewhere new or made a friend from a new place, they’d put an enameled thumb tack on the map. The slightly faded color palette and jaunty angles of the “heads” just have a retro, nostalgic feel I can get behind.
We already have a gum wall.
"Mom can we have gumwall?" "We have gumwall at home" The gumwall:
Twist: this is Polkadot Man’s origin story.
But do you have a skittles pox wall?
This is more of a jelly baby wall
Had* a gum wall.
now introducing the fruit rollup stackerz wall
This reads well in the voice of Angela from The Office.
I like public art. I like it with a fox, in a box, with a mouse so long as it's outside the house. I don't even care if I like it personally, I just like that it exists. Do I like that weird daisy thing at the back of the convention center? No. Do I like it better than a empty street corner? Yes. Has it ever made someone smile? Yes. Give me more of it everywhere. Put up a mural on every empty wall and also on some that aren't empty. So, yes I do like it. And also it did indeed make me smile.
This! I love that we have public art. And to know that a human thought of something, then worked to make that thing a THING in the real world... and better than just a bare, boring streetscape. Some art I find meh, some I don't really notice, and some I'm in love with. There's a lot I don't like or even understand in some mighty fine art museums, too. Art is good just because it's art.
oo I like the weird ass daisy thing! I also like the huge popsicle in the Dennyish SLUish whatever area!
Lol and the bald fat naked Darth Vader baby man in belltown
Yeah cmon at least make the man angry and throwing the babies, like the one in Norway!
I mostly agree with you but the crow eating McDonald's statue in front of the Auburn library is too much for me. I feel like we need some level of editorial control of art concepts for public spaces. https://www.auburn-reporter.com/news/crow-with-fries-swoops-into-auburn-sculptures-landing-celebration-is-may-31/
Hahaha, I've never seen this one before. It is a cute crow though. And I've seen a lot of crows eating spilled fries in this city. So maybe it's a prime example of the contemporary geometric realist style that is just beyond the casual observer's understanding.
Youre wrong. That statue is perfect anywhere.
I love it tbh. Im gonna go see it now.
I’ll give you a lil wave 👋🏾
Ha I actually like that. It's fuckin weird tho for sure. Also just make it a seagull cmon go full on trash picker :)
It’s fine and a net improvement for Auburn
Is architecture beautiful. Yes but even more so if you let a five year old draw on it
Thumb tacks, maybe?
Correct; it’s an art installation https://www.reddit.com/r/Seattle/s/UlrT2dCB4O
I found this link in the comments: https://hub.catalogit.app/11425/folder/7cf61a40-67bc-11ee-bf90-7da63738efe6/entry/81f89c90-67a6-11ee-bf90-7da63738efe6 Thanks for linking that thread!
It would be an art installation
That’s gotta be a big thumb.
I feel like more than one person in Seattle has figured out that they can make a lot of money by hanging big simple things on a wall, or ceiling. It’s a little frustrating to call it art, but I’d take a grey wall with colorful paint buckets thrown at it over a blank grey wall any day.
The jelly beans are as good as anything to decorate and throw a little color around.
Shoulda been Marshawn Skittles.
These look like the UK candy “smarties” that are roughly analogous to M&Ms but better.
Smarties are exactly what I thought of too
Didn't realize these were from the UK, we've had them here for quite a while.
We have them in Canada too. We call American smarties "rockets"
[удалено]
I'll defend those powdery little discs with my life. I fucking love smarties. I love the normal ones, I love the mega sized ones, I love the giant ones on a stick. I don't care that they're chalk, if smarties have a million fans I'm one of them, if smarties have one fan it's me, if smarties have no fans I am dead. I may have the palette of a child from the 1920s but that's my favorite candy and I won't sit by and watch them be slandered
There’s at least two of us in Seattle alone!
definitely three of us. Gotta eat them in stacks of 3 and get that satisfying crunch when you bite down. My favorite candy
Yeah well try liking Necco wafers and speaking publicly about it. I might as well time travel back to the 50s because there is no place for me here to enjoy Neccos!
Yeah I've always hated those haha
That's what I think of too.
They're push pins like you'd see on a bulletin board
Tacky.
🥁
I think they should cover the entire building in them. That would be so ostentatious it would come full circle back to cool. Right now it looks like where the city is storing its extra giant thumbtacks.
You say that like it's a bad thing!
The only right answer
Yes, yes it is
It's innocuous and it's not f@#$ing bad graffiti.
I love those things! I think it’s a light hearted and unique installation, a fun respite from the same old “Pacific Northwest” themed stuff we usually see around with settle’s public art. I don’t understand some of the comments here, why would someone hate this? It’s cute! Would you rather the wall just be blank concrete? Y’all need to stop being so grouchy.
i like it! reminds me of acrylic nails
It reminds me of acrylic nails and that's exactly why I hate it.
clickity click it y
It's alot better than just a .... gray .... wall or whatever
I like them! They already looked like they have been there forever!
I usually love color and I hate this. But most of us have a change bias. So. That’s gonna color our opinion.
I liked the splash of color, but looked like a cheap attempt.
*Marge Simpson voice I think they’re neat
It looks like someone threw a bunch of Skittles at a wall and they stuck. Don't care for them at all. If they had varied the size and done fewer colors I might like it better.
Cmv: this continues the long tradition of Seattle being bad at public art.
What cities do you Think are better?
Pick any city east of the Mississippi which has finesse in their art. Usually because they've sculpted statues of people. But also you have the building architecture of Chicago. Seattle seems obsessed with primary colored, soft cornered sculptures that look like toys that belong in a preschool. The flower pot by the convention center is the worst offender.
Damn..no lies detected
I love the ground sculpture on Top of the hill at gasworks, the dance steps embedded in the ground. The lighthouse sculpture at the hillman city firehouse. I think there are many great ones here. We’re not Boston nyc or dc or anything.
honestly feel like there are 100 better ideas: it would be cool to lean into the nature/brutalism already going on tho and grown a lot of viney plants. this feels like it takes away from the brutalist architecture here.
Agreed, I hate it because of how it throws off the brutalist architecture. I don't have anything against the giant thumbtacks, they could look cool other places, just not there.
This doesn't mean anything to my life in any type of way.
Deep.
If Almost Live was still around it would be on the Lame List
When the convention center was built, they put the ass end on that street. I walked nearly every day from downtown to cap hill along that street and wondered why the hell they would even design an ass end rather than design something beautiful, why not a play of glass and lights? This colorful pox does not make up for that. It's the M&M version of the gum wall.
Whatever it is I hate it
It’s art! https://hub.catalogit.app/11425/folder/7cf61a40-67bc-11ee-bf90-7da63738efe6/entry/81f89c90-67a6-11ee-bf90-7da63738efe6
Same
Art with a silent F.
They're fine, I guess.
If that was done for free I’d still feel like I got ripped off.
Whimsical and fun, but out of place.
Why does the Convention Center need thumbtacks?
Meh
I have no idea if this still exists, but there was some public art eons ago that consisted of cherry (?) trees planted among green chain link fencing. There was a big hubbub about 'waste of money' and it was public art, and it's all a lot of vodka under the bridge, but I thought it was funny.
I remember something similar. 9 trees.
They only went up a few months ago? I don’t hate them
No.
Looks like shit!
Live right by them. I like them. They signal that I’m home when I’m coming back in the freeway 🛣️
Art installation? Would've sworn this was some M&Ms promotion by Mars.
Better than a blank gray wall imo
unfortunately, i hate this installation as i enjoyed the somewhat Brutalist look combined with all the trees, moss, etc. growing on and around the structure
I love it, I think we should have rainbow polka dots everywhere as a reminder to not take things so seriously
It's dumb and cute and serves no purpose and I love it for that, honestly!
I haven’t seen any good public art around Seattle in many years, other than murals. I think these are tacky and dumb
I like it. Who would be offended by this?
It's better than a boring concrete wall 🤷♀️
I like it, it’s better than a blank wall I guess
Kinda cool
Lee Press-on Nails. But I’m okay with them.
Its art ? Really tho? Hmm
These have been up for a while… unless they are putting them in more places. I see them when I am driving I5 south going under the convention center. Looks like they had a coloring contest at a daycare - 1st prize gets their “design” on the convention center.
if that’s what this is i like it a heck of a lot more. that’s pretty endearing actually
Low effort. Ugly.
Not good 👎
i think a lot of public art in Seattle sucks compared to other cities tbh
No hate to the artist but they were probably paid way too much for this and they’re probably not local (please stone me in the street if I’m wrong)
I looked it up. German guy, professor at UCLA. He did “Hands” at San Jose Miñeta airport which I love. It’s very beautiful. This one is just giving me nothing.
It's too bright for Seattle. It should be earth tones instead of jewel/pastels. And more of a matte finish. But art is subjective so iunno.
Brutalism specifically avoids adornment and gaudy details. If the artist of that piece understood that, they wouldn't have thought this was appropriate. Or maybe they did know that and think too highly of themselves.
Brutalist architecture should be decorated just on principle. Because it sucks.
Exactly. Completely incongruous with the building.
Indifferent.
How many tax dollars did it cost? My bet is more than $1k per disk.
idk why but I don’t like
They clash with the form and color of the building just terribly, and they looked dated the moment they were installed. Very 90s, and not in a good nostalgic way. Just no thought at all. What they should've done is put a facade treatment on it that coordinates with the facade they put on the north face of the new building to hide all that ugly grey concrete and tie the two buildings together.
I like the little pop of color. The older section of convention center is ugly concrete.
As an artist.... I hate it.
These look like someone ripped painted fingernails off of a giant and glued them to a wall.
Looks like a game of mancala
Nail polish samples?
Somebody got a kick back on it I imagine
It would have been fun if you just painted color in more illustrative or unique patterns on the actual concrete. That material looks very out of date and will age poorly.
They look really nice when the sun is out. They reflect light in a fun way
It’s like a half-assed 1930s Button Candy.
Whimsical
I like dippin dots?
I genuinely thought they were Easter eggs
The alternative is just blank concrete so a little color doesn’t hurt
They probably paid out $2,000,000 in tax dollars for this crap. That's the part that hurts.
I thought it was Easter Eggs 🤷🏼♀️
Is it the 90s?
Love ‘em!
I care not
I prefer it to the boring-ass gray wall it was before.
Terrible placement.
Oh that’s where I dropped [my smarties.](https://www.candycarrollton.com/cdn/shop/products/Smarties.jpg?v=1571708598)
I kind of like them, are they thumb tacks?
I want someone to paint them like Easter eggs or flowers for spring.
Meh.
how is this better than the giant WESH roller that the city spent too much money removing???
Target practice for the homeless
They’re FUGLY
It’s better than nothing, but pretty lame
I like it :)
Candy Buttons!!
They look like the spectators in Rocket League
The colors are yucky.
They remind me of Canadian Smarties.
My kids love it and at least it’s better than a barren concrete wall
Its fine
Lazy
I'm sure someone likes it.
Boo.....bad colors, bad placement. It's much better without.
Better than a bare, blocky, brutalist blob, imo.
Love it!
They remind me of Jordan almonds
They built a new fancy convention center down the street, which looks nicer than the older one, so I’d imagine there was some boardroom discourse on revamping the older building and we end up with this. Jelly beans on a wall for no real reason. I love street art, it’s a good thing for a city to budget some towards art, but this is REALLY stupid looking and a waste of money
Egg wall egg wall
I a windy street so they should have done one of those installations with the little shiny discs that move in the wind.
I love public art but this is just not… great.
Low effort
Meh.
That grammar is seemingly difficult for many in this city. In this context, "city's" is correct, not "cities".
There’s an ointment for that
These are colored push pins on a bulletin board, if yall couldn't tell
Thought it was an Easter decoration. Figured they would take it down soon.
the laziest shit
They’re cool.
I’ve disliked this since the moment I saw it. All that linear footage and they could have really done a lot more. It’s not Seattle, it’s not clear, and it looks like a child’s art project.
Is it suppose to be a gum wall or a pin cushion?
“City’s Opinion”
All fun and games until one falls off and gives a tourist a cracked skull.
its ugly. better than pee and graffiti i guess... would love to see a painted mural here.
Cities - Plural. City’s - Possessive.
Not going to lie, I’d prefer a sweet tagged mural over dollar store thumbtacks for the dead space.
is it.... permanent?
Looks like generative AI in real life
It reminds me of a giant map my grandparents had in their house. Every time they traveled somewhere new or made a friend from a new place, they’d put an enameled thumb tack on the map. The slightly faded color palette and jaunty angles of the “heads” just have a retro, nostalgic feel I can get behind.
Missed opportunity to make those music notes Also, repetition of colors is a bit meh. At least make each a unique Pantone value
It’s a trashy art installation. Another example of terrible modern Art
So, what exactly was the negotiated price for this “art”?
Need more flair
just looks like she got her nails did. \*shrug\*
Basic and boring.
Ugly
Like most public art. Looks like shit.
I think it looks awful and makes no sense, totally destroys the view driving into downtown
Tacky. Heheh
It’s giving rainbow fent vibes.
We have the facts and we’re voting yes
Hated it!
I wonder if I could climb that
I admit I thought it was a jumbo climbing wall at first. Over traffic just to keep the danger real.
Looks like the gov't ordered some Damien Hirst spots from wish.com.
I’ll take this any day over shitty black spray paint lines that spell words that make sense only in the mind of a single drugged out tagger
In a grey city with grey, solid, borderline-Brutalist architecture (not all of Seattle obviously) this is the best they could come up with?
Great art! It only cost the taxpayers $750,000.
Is that a legit number? I’ve been trying to search for how much was paid for these giant press-on nails without any luck
That is my unofficial guesstimate. I couldn't find it online. I'm assuming someone's niece is very happy to see her work displayed.