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A pair of 45-foot-tall Paintbrush Gateway sculptures by world renowned artist Dennis Oppenheim will be installed in downtown Las Vegas during the overnight hours. The installation will begin Tuesday night, July 27, with work continuing through early Wednesday morning, and is scheduled to resume Wednesday night, July 28, and be completed by Thursday morning, July 29. Crews plan to set the artwork on foundations installed on Charleston Boulevard at Main Street and at Las Vegas Boulevard. Work started May 24 and a ceremonial dedication will be held when the project is completed in August.
Oppenheim specially designed his Paintbrush Gateway sculptures to serve as way-finding guides to the Las Vegas Arts District. Oppenheim’s creation is two large-scale paintbrushes that, when lit, will cause the brush tips to emit an array of lights into the sky.
“The Paintbrush Gateway projects a stroke, 1,600 feet long, going into darkness, thus echoing an artist’s excursion into the unknown,” said Oppenheim, who currently lives and works in New York.
Oppenheim has exhibited his works internationally in galleries and museums including the Tate Gallery, London; Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; Whitney Museum of American Art and The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris; Galerie Pro Arte, Germany; and the Joseph Helman Gallery, New York.
The Las Vegas Arts District, referred to as “18b,” is a classic urban mix of residential, commercial and cultural uses that continues to grow as the hub of the arts scene in Las Vegas. The name, "18b," represents the original Arts District area, which consisted of 18 blocks. Today, the Arts District area has grown beyond those original 18 blocks and is located in the area of Commerce Street, Hoover Avenue, Fourth Street, and Las Vegas Boulevard at Charleston and Colorado Avenue.
The Paintbrush Gateways is an Art in Public Places project sponsored by the city of Las Vegas Arts Commission and Nevada Department of Transportation in cooperation with the 18b Arts District. Funding for the art component was provided by a 1 percent set aside fund, where one percent of capital projects budgets built within the city are set aside to create art. Richardson Construction is the contractor. The city of Las Vegas Department of Public Works is managing the project. More information regarding this and other public art projects sponsored by the city of Las Vegas Arts Commission is available at www.lvartscommission.com.
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