HomeMy WebLinkAbout1/21/2020 Item 15, Papp (3)
Tonikian, Victoria
From:James Papp <jamesralphpapp@hotmail.com>
Sent:Tuesday,
To:E-mail Council Website; CityClerk
Subject:Public art amendment letter: last 2 of 26 signers: former mayor Allen Settle and Cal
Poly Emeritus Professor of Physics Rich Saenz
The SLO City Council has proposed this change to our public art policy: “The City shall
accept a ‘Work of Art’ that commemorates ideas, ideals and concepts – not
individual and actual people.”
We reject this attempt by the council to restrict how our community may remember and
interpret our past. A community is made of its “actual people.” Its suffering, its heroism,
and its progress are the suffering, heroism, and progress of actual people—be they 9/11’s
first responders, the victims of Japanese relocation, or Rosario Cooper, who rescued the
Northern Chumash language. This attempt to erase human beings from our past will
censor our artists and police our thoughts and emotions. No government has ever
attempted to purge people from the sphere of public space and public memory. To make
San Luis Obispo the prototype of this dehumanizing policy brings international
embarrassment to our community.
Cynthia Meyer, Artist
Lynn Hessler, Artist
Gini Griffin, Artist
Robin Mize, Artist
Donna Hoff, Artist
Bobbye West-Thompson, Artist
Richard Ayres, Photographer
Shane VerPlanck, Photographer
Victoria Grostick, Ceramicist
Basil Jenkins, former Director, Fowler Foundation Museum and Professor of Art History
Robert Inchausti, Professor of Literature, Cal Poly
John Ashbaugh, History Instructor, Hancock College, and former Council Member, City of
SLO
David Brodie, Emeritus Professor of Architecture and City Planning, Cal Poly
Allan Cooper, Emeritus Professor of Architecture, Cal Poly
David Hannings, Emeritus Professor of Horticulture, Cal Poly
Rich Saenz, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Cal Poly
Jim Andre, retired Professor of Finance, USC
Kathi Settle, Chair, Jack House Committee, City of SLO
James Papp, Architectural Historian and Member, Cultural Heritage Committee, City of
SLO
Allen Settle, former Mayor, City of SLO
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Wendy Lucas, Tribal Member, yak tityu tityu yak tilhini
Thomas Wheeler, Archaeologist
Patrick Michelsen, Construction Worker/Linnaea’s Barista
Gordon Bosserman, Of Counsel, Andre, Morris, & Buttery
Alex Gough, Adobe Realty, Sauer-Adams Adobe
Anne Gough, Business Owner, Yarns at the Adobe, Sauer-Adams Adobe
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