Siah Armajani. Alicia Chillida

Born in Tehran in 1939 and settled in the United States in the 1960s, Siah Armajani is one of the leading representatives of the so-called Public Art, a concept that he himself has contributed to forge through his work as well as his writings and manifestos. By Public Art means those works which, apart from their specific artistic function, must have a specific character and a specific function public. Works that have to be able to meet the needs of man in the community.

From his first creations, which responded to purely conceptual approaches, Siah Armajani has followed a logical evolution that has led him, first, to question the role of the artist and of art in today's society - and more specifically in the American democracy in which he himself lives and works - and then to propose and realize a type of work that challenges the traditionally established boundaries between fine arts, design, carpentry, urban planning or engineering, and whose aim is to respond to real, practical needs of the community, with the desire to improve their daily lives, design, carpentry, urban planning or engineering, and whose aim is to respond to the real, practical needs of the community to which they are addressed, with the desire to improve their daily lives. It is not surprising, therefore, that the artist claims the heritage of the utopian tradition, from the Enlightenment to the Russian avant-garde, in his successive manifestos.

We could find a summary of his concept of Public Art in one of the paragraphs of the manifesto specially prepared for this exhibition: "Public art is not about oneself, but about others. It is not about personal tastes, but about the needs of others. It is not about the artist's anguish, but about the happiness and well-being of others. It is not about the myth of the artist, but about his civic sense. It does not seek to make people feel dwarfed and insignificant, but to glorify them. It does not deal with the gap between culture and the public, but seeks to make art public and the artist a citizen again."

The content of the exhibition has been proposed by the artist, who has taken into account the characteristics of the space of the Crystal Palace and the type of viewer who comes to it, given its location in one of the most important public parks in the city. It presents both models and full-scale pieces. Those, whether or not they are sketches for a later full-scale construction, acquire in Armajani's hands all the value of an artistic piece in itself.

The exhibition presents pieces from the series Park Furniture / Park furniture, the author starts from the tradition of simple and functional carpentry, commonly used as furniture in public parks and domestic gardens in North America. In this way he reflects on this way of life and its history. To this end, he introduces subtle transformations and paradoxical juxtapositions, such as wheels that evoke the roads of the pioneers and the American expansion towards the West, or doors that open to frame our vision of our surroundings.

The exhibition also presents thirty-five models of some of the series on which the artist has been working since the 1970s: Dictionary for buildings / Dictionary to build, (1974-75); The art of Bridgemaking / The art of bridge building, (1987-89); Street Corners / Street corners, (1994-96); y Homages to Anarchists / Tributes to anarchists, (1991- 92). Also included is the model for the Staten Island lighthouse (1995). Finally, this exhibition at the Palacio de Cristal includes Armajani's first project for Spain. It is the model entitled Picnic table for Huesca / Huesca Picnic Table, (1999).