Midwest art installation pushes boundaries of urban space

From a distance, it's the eye-catching primary colors that lure visitors to a new installation on a bustling downtown corner of Columbus, Indiana.

But upon closer inspection, "Apart, Together," designed by Suzanne Lettieri, M.Arch. '11, and Michael Jefferson, M.Arch. '11, faculty in the College of Architecture, Art and Planning, reveals hidden layers.

What from afar resembled a wall or billboard is resolved into its components: roughly 90 vertical wooden panels arranged at 45-degree angles to each other, stretching accordion-style some 50 feet down a sidewalk bordering Ovation Plaza in this small Midwestern city renowned as an unlikely mecca of modern architecture.

As one walks along and around the piece - part of Exhibit Columbus, a prominent stage for emerging designers - circles, squares and blocks of color materialize and dissolve. The word "yes" in block letters comes in and out of focus on the street-facing side. Then, point a smart device at the panels' swatches of red, yellow, blue and green, and the surface transforms into an "urban cinema screen." Through a web-based app, each color activates a stream of digital photo or video content. (You can try it while viewing the images on this page.)

"It's an exciting moment when people realize they can manipulate their built environment in a very immediate way, through the app," said Lettieri, a co-director of &Labat AAP. "We're trying to expand possibilities for the community to be involved with the project."

Lettieri and Jefferson, assistant professor and lecturer, respectively, in the Department of Architecture and co-principals of Jefferson Lettieri Office (JE-LE), were one of 13 teams or individuals selected to participate in the biannual exhibition that runs through November. The designers embraced this year's theme of "Yes And" by creating a civic space where diverse interests can be explored and visitors complete the experience.

That's achieved using "chromakeyed" colors - the term for the green-screen technology that supports TV weather reports and computer-generated imagery in movies. Though any color could be chromakeyed, green and blue (as non-flesh tones) are used most often, while yellow enabled innovative special effects in the 1964 film "Mary Poppins." The bright colors and widely recognized technology help make "Apart, Together" accessible while enabling a range of experiences, the designers said.

"Chromakey is very approachable, but also historically has been a medium that artists have used to challenge societal norms," Lettieri said. "It has this ability to alter our visual expectations or create alternative realities."

"We want to push the boundaries of what urban or architectural space can be, or what one's experience or understanding of the built environment could be, through the use of chromakey," Jefferson added. "In a way it dismantles the walls of urban and civic space."

Since Exhibit Columbus opened in August, the installation's colors have been keyed to feeds celebrating the city of Columbus. They include archival (red) and contemporary (green) imagery; the 2017 independent film "Columbus" (blue); and a video promoting two of the project's community partners, the nonprofit Lincoln-Central Neighborhood Family Centerand YES Cinema(yellow). A third partner, Ovation Technology Group, owns the corner plaza site.

In October, streaming content will be changed to support the cinema's upcoming film festival, YESFest- including information made available only through the installation, and short films by local students.

In developing the project, the designers thought about the experience at drive-in movie theaters, where in a shared space patrons with varying interests may tune their radios to multiple screens. Similarly, "Apart, Together" folds four screens into one.

"It's a way to bring people together in civic space," Jefferson said. "Instead of people tuning into their phones and out of public society, we wanted to invert that relationship by using phones to bring people together."

"It's about creating a civic space where everyone's individuality can shine - while also reminding us of what we share," the designers told guests during the exhibit's opening. "In other words: a place to be apart, and together."

Ryan Whitby, a visiting critic in the Department of Architecture, designed the web app supporting "Apart, Together." In addition to Jefferson and Lettieri's work, Exhibit Columbus includes contributions by several AAP alumni: Andrew Fu, B.Arch. '15, Aaron Goldstein, B.Arch. '15, and Aleksandr Mergold, B.Arch. '00 are among the six University Design Research Fellowship teams. Studio Cooke John, founded by Nina Cooke John, B.Arch. '95, was awarded a J. Irwin and Xenia S. Miller Prize. Exhibit Columbus previously featuredwork by AAP faculty members Jennifer Newsomand Tom Carruthers.