Participatory Art in Public Spaces

Literature Review: Participatory Art in Public Spaces
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Literature Review: Participatory Art in Public Places Art creates an interactive platform where artists or curators engage the viewers’ perspectives, ideas, and opinions about on the different forms of artworks exhibited. In most instances, the viewers only participated as the audience for the artists’ works in exhibitions and museums across the globe. However, art as an interactive platform between the creators and the audience is shifting towards an integrated forum characterized by the public’s participation as the collaborative or co-producing agents in creating the art. The authorial control in creating art shifts to the audience or public as they become active citizens in the art (O'Neill, 2010). In essence, the traditional event-based exhibitions and installations of art is currently undergoing a shift towards interactive art where the public actively experiences the art and its exhibition space. The public’s participation in art may take various forms including one-on-one engagement with the artist about key elements of their works and sharing of ideas and perceptions about the works exhibited. People get to internalize the different aspects of art while engaging with the art’s environment in developing their perceptions, views, and ideas on the art works. Participatory art further allows for the use of different sites or venues for the creation of art reflecting further interaction with the socio-cultural domain. Lee Mingwei’s participatory art installations makes for one of the examples of participatory art in public spaces where the public gets an opportunity to actively engage in the creation of art. Mingwei’s platforms allows individuals to intimately explore themselves towards enhancing their self-awareness by engaging in the development art in their natural setting. Participatory art in public spaces is a growing phenomenon gaining widespread support and interest from the public across the social, political, and economic domains evidenced by the increasing occurrence of such events worldwide. Provided herein is a literature review on the development of participatory art in public spaces highlighting some of its key elements and features. According to Paul O’Neill (2010) participatory art in public spaces features three main stages; the relational, social, and durational. The author’s article, Three stages in the art of public participation: The relational, social, and durational, begins by defining participation as the art’s ability to engage with its audience as collaborators, co-producers or other active agents (O'Neill, 2010). The article further embraces the term participation in reference to the different stages and ways in which the public or audiences engage with art. The public’s engagement with art occurs in the relational, social, and durational stages. According to the author, the relational stage of participatory art in public spaces highlights the art’s ability to create interactive engagement with the viewer by creating familiar situations and encounters. The development of interactive act allows for the corporeal involveme...