Artist Buster Simpson’s “Orange Line and Concrete Poetry Impressions” project in Portland, OR might remind New Yorkers of Christo’s Gates in Central Park, but Simpson’s work is more utilitarian. Selected “Alignment Artist” for the Portland-Milwaukie Light Rail Project, Simpson used the official orange silt fence wrapped around the construction site as his canvas. He invited the public and local poets to submit writings (50 characters or less) to spray-paint and/or stencil onto the “orange lining.” Those chosen words are now being “set in stone” — i.e., stamped into freshly laid concrete sidewalks. The big idea is to celebrate the “civic beauty of this grand infrastructure project.”
Simpson is also working on the entrance to the Bellevue Library parking garage. He’s installing a façade of aluminum automobile license plates hanging from a wire fence with the letters of the alphabet (randomly) stamped on the back. The Seattle-based artist is having his first retrospective, “Buster Simpson: Surveyor”, at The Frye Art Museum until October 13, 2013.
Buster Simpson, Orange Linings and Concrete Poetry Impressions Project
