After the devastating impact of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans has developed City Assisted Evacuation, a plan to evacuate up to 30,000 residents who lack transportation in the event of a category three or higher hurricane. But the 17 evacuation pick-up points are all marked by easy-to-miss signs, so the city’s Arts Council of New Orleans and the non-profit Evacuteer.org teamed up to commission a $200,000 public art project by Massachusetts-based artist Douglas Kornfeld, who created a series of 14-foot-tall sculptures to mark each of the pick-up spots.
The giant stainless steel sculptures, which depict a stick figure-like form that seems to be hailing a bus or taxi, are being installed at the so-called “EvacuSpots” throughout the city this month in time for the official start of hurricane season on June 1st.
“The figures are posed in the gesture of hailing a cab,” Kornfeld told the Times-Picayune during a recent visit to the metal shop where the pieces were stored, “which everybody instinctively knows how to do — no one teaches you how to hail a cab. This was the result of the purpose of the project, which was to provide a symbol that people would understand; that this is a place where you go, if you need transportation out of the city.”
Kornfeld was one of 80 artists from all over the U.S. who responded to the Arts Council of New Orleans’s open call. His design was selected just over a year ago, despite its lack of any identifiably local symbolism, at least as far as he knew. “During the middle of my pitch to the jury,” Kornfeld said, “when I was presenting my design, someone interrupted me and said, ‘Well, that gesture of hailing a cab is the same gesture people do when they want someone to throw them beads from floats during Mardi Gras.’”
Each sculpture, which the artist says will last for a century, features a plaque outlining evacuation tips and rules (see above). The sculptures themselves, however, are intentionally simple and familiar. “I didn’t want to create something threatening or anxiety producing,” Kornfeld said. “I wanted something that would not alarm people, but would be very recognizable.”
— Benjamin Sutton
(Images courtesy Evacuspots/Facebook.)
