By Daksha Pillai Contributing writer
July 9, 2024
The new transit center and parking garage, currently under construction, will feature an art installation by Xavier Cortada, internationally renowned Cuban-American eco-artist.
Entitled “Floral River,” the installation will span 1,200 feet on the back wall of the facility, visible from the interior of the garage and Clinton Street. Through hand painted tiles and glass mosaic, Cortada will depict the Kentucky River as a cascade of native wildflowers.
“There’s nothing more magical on this planet than a flower blooming from nothing,” Cortada said in a recent interview with The State Journal.
Cortada’s place in question seems to be everywhere. He is the only artist to have created work at both the North and South Pole, as well as many sites in between including his beloved hometown of Miami. Frankfort became Cortada’s next destination after he was selected through a nationwide call by Josephine Sculpture Park and the City of Frankfort for mixed multi-media artists.
Cortada emphasized that while he isn’t a Frankfort native, he has immense respect for both the environment and community he intends to represent. One of the goals for his installation is to encourage families to plant Kentucky wildflowers in their yard, cultivating beautiful sites for pollinators as well as a sense of responsibility in children to the natural world. Another is to foster a deeper relationship between residents and the Kentucky River, which is a crucial source of drinking water for much of the state.
“In many ways, the river spells this interface not just between land and water but between space and time and history and biology. I just want all those conversations, in a non-didactical way, in a more spiritual, inspirational way to acknowledge the river,” Cortada said.
Intertwined with this appreciation of natural beauty is a sense of urgency regarding the ongoing impacts of climate change as well as its man-made causes. A parking garage filled with gasoline-guzzling vehicles and politicians voting against the retirement of fossil fuel plants may seem like an unorthodox place to advocate for action, but Cortada sees the location of the installation in the capital city as crucial.
“I want the legislators who will park in that garage and the lobbyists who will walk through the halls … to pause and reflect upon their connection to the river that they can see in front of them on the wall. It’s my way of trying to create proximity and understanding.”
Broward County’s Public Art & Design Program commissioned Xavier Cortada to create public art for Port Everglades Terminals 2 and 4 in 2013 and 2014. Port Everglades is a seaport in Fort Lauderdale, FL, known as a gateway for both international trade and cruise vacations. (Photo courtesy of Xavier Cortada)
However, Cortada makes it known that while his work has political implications, his overarching goal is to unite communities through nature, not divide them.
“Maybe instead of finding so many ways to hate, we can find so many ways to love,” Cortada said. “That’s a tall order for a bunch of glazed ceramic and aluminum cut metal but I use it not as a magic wand to solve a problem but instead as a place for individuals to reflect on their superpowers to solve the problem.”
“Floral River” is being developed throughout this summer and fall, alongside the construction of the transit center. Like Cortada’s other works, it will be expansive, vivid and stunning. But that’s not all the artist wants it to be.
“I do hope this is something that is seen as more than beautiful. I hope that it is seen as something meaningful. But that’s not up to me, that’s up to the community to decide what they want to do,” Cortada added.
See original article at https://www.state-journal.com/news/cuban-american-eco-artists-work-to-be-featured-on-new-transit-center/article_9913e2ae-3d48-11ef-8587-378deaf5d804.html