An Image of Green Lightning!
Thanks to everyone who responded in regards to the search for Green Lighting. Paul M. actually tracked down an image of the sculpture, which was cool because I had never seen what it looked like. The caption below the image read: "Green Lightning, 1984. Steel, LEXAN, tin, transformers, neon, electricity, wire, animators and concrete. Billie Lawless." The site that the image was pulled from was... you guessed it, www.billielawless.com. So much for me being a super-sleuth. Anyways, the links were not working when I went to the site, so there was not a whole lot of info to go along with the image.
Mark (another email) passed along his thoughts on Green Lightning: "I heard it was installed somewhere in Chicago. It was one thing for it to be installed in conservative Buffalo, however with the ultra-conservative mayor that existed at that time, it was doomed to die. The mayor had it dismantled." Steel, can you see what you can find out on the Chicago end of things?
I'm a fairly liberal guy, but it just seems f'in stupid to have dancing penis' welcoming people to the city of Buffalo. It seems more like a high school prank than art.
FYI: The links work fine if you use Internet Explorer
From the BLawless website:
Green Lightning was originally conceived as a project at Artpark, Lewiston, New York for the 1983 season (maquette submitted).
It was subsequently erected in Buffalo, New York in 1984 (Video Clip of Dedication) and heavily damaged a week after its unveiling by the City of Buffalo and City of Buffalo Arts Commission (Director, David More.) Its total destruction was prevented when Lawless obtained a court order halting the destruction which was begun by the City under the cloak of darkness well after the Courts had closed.
Lawless was one of eight artists accepted to exhibit at Sculpture Chicago '85 in the Spring of 1985. The jurors, Howard Fox of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Mary Jane Jacobs of the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL and John Chandler, Director of Supervision, Art Consultancy and Management, Boston, MA, selected Lawless' Green Lightning (2 minute video clip) which was subsequently installed at Harrison and Wells Streets in the South Loop. It stood for five years with no controversy (5 minute video clip for those with patience).
In 1992 a jury in the New York State Supreme Court ruled that the Mayor of the City of Buffalo and the City of Buffalo Urban Renewal Agency had violated Mr. Lawless' civil rights with its unauthorized actions in 1984.
In the Spring of 1993 Green Lightning was accepted into an exhibition to be held at the Manhattan Psychiatric Center in New York, New York. The exhibition was sponsored by the Association of Independent Artists and curated by John Rosis and Glenn Reed (See prospectus for this exhibiton).
When the Director of the Center (Michael Ford) voiced his objections to the sculpture both curators (artists living in New York City) attempted to pressure Lawless into submitting another piece.
Lawless refused and the American Civil Liberties Union initiated litigation.
Justice Ira Gammerman of the New York State Supreme Court ruled that the Manhattan Psychiatric Center did have to exhibit the piece but that it was not required to give Lawless the site which he had requested. The Center offered a piece of land which was not large enough to hold the sculpture which effectively precluded Lawless from exhibiting the piece.
No artists from the exhibition voiced any support for Lawless.
Maybe you didn't get it, but I sent you a closer-up image, better revealing the comically phallic nature of the piece.
I'm no Griffin fan, but I can't say I blame him for taking this thing down. It's not exactly community-oriented.
Evil_Ed, no i never got it for some reason. Thanks for sending that link. I'm gonna check it out now.
QE
You should post the picture in the comment above. It is very funny and a very beautiful picture. My wife and I know Mary Jane Jacob so I might be able to dig something up for you.
Buffalo got a bad rap for being too conservative after this was installed. But in reality it was a very bold sculpture to install in the first place.
Chicago is famous for art controversy. There is one incident where the city alderman stormed into the Art Institute and attempeted to remove a piece of art that they felt defamed former mayor Harold Washington. There was also an incident with a student work at the School of the Art Institute that involved a flag on the floor issue . In NYC Giuliani created a stir over the elephant covered Mary image being displayed there.
Some art is intended to stir things up. I think Green lightning acomplished exactly what the artist intended it to.
Steel,
The portrait of Mary was covered in Dung, known here as feces,poop,etc.. .
Glad to see this again, I barely remember it. Along the same line of thought, does anyone have a picture of the Statue of David in Delaware Park wearing the pair of short the Griffin administration had made for him?
Buffalo doesn't dick around
Guess this explains the heavy Buffalo traffic on my site. Interesting.
Strange statues from around the world:
http://haha.nu/funny/strange-statues-around-the-world/
Why not Buffalo?
Note BL's page, last updated Aug 11:
"What do I remember most about the 'community' of Buffalo, NY? The two grad students who were doing their PhD on Thoreau and grew wild flowers in their front lawn...they were prosecuted and it actually went to trial. Then there was the shooting of Dr. Barnett Slepian in his kitchen whilst talking to his wife and son. A mean spirited place. What a friend of mine used to call 'a collection tiny talents....' "