Developers guide to public art

“+ Art: A Developer’s Guide to Public Art” Provides Procedures and Best Practices for Including Art in the Development Process

Developers, builders and architects seeking to incorporate art into their projects have a new resource as the Metro Nashville Arts Commission (Metro Arts) today released “+ Art: A Developer’s Guide to Public Art,” a manual of processes and best practices that Metro Arts has honed through its management and expansion of the city’s public art collection.

“We envision this guide as a useful tool to answer some of our most frequently asked questions about including public art in private developments,” said Metro Arts Executive Director Caroline Vincent. “Although we don’t commission art outside of Metro Nashville’s public art collection, we are often asked about how to incorporate art and artists into a project. We we work with artists every day and are able to share best practices around public art and placemaking. This guide is a step-by-step manual of the most effective methods we’ve found for managing the public art process from beginning to end.”

Developed by Metro Arts with input from local developers and community members, “+ Art” is designed to guide the user through topics such as defining public art, beginning a project, hiring an artist, gathering community feedback and planning for long-term maintenance of the artwork and offers examples of art incorporated into hospitals, subdivisions, hotels and other private developments.

The guide is the second recent tool from Metro Arts to assist private citizens with public art; in fall 2018 the agency released “Art for (W)all: A Guide to Making Murals in Nashville.” Both guides are available the “Resources and Toolkits” page of www.artsnashville.org.