Cbus52: Columbus in a Year: Urban Plein Air Paintings

Urban Plein Air Painting - Deb Haller

In 2012, the Columbus Public Art initiative commissioned artists from the Central Ohio Plein Air group to paint 24x26 inch murals for the public art display Finding Time. Finding Time included temporary and more permanent artworks exhibited in downtown Columbus for 200Columbus the Bicentennial, the 200th anniversary of the founding of the city. Finding Time included art and events throughout 2012 with work by more than 50 artists both from the central Ohio area and artists from around the globe. I most enjoyed the pieces I was able to see on my drive to work, "Columbus never..." by Janet Zweig and the Bicentennial Towers by David Best on Broad Street Bridge.

The art I really wanted to see though, were the Urban Plein Air Paintings. They were meant to be discovered by pedestrians on their walk to work or while running errands downtown. I drive through downtown often, but rarely walk downtown. I did see one painting on Broad Street everyday on my way to work, but I wasn't sure where the other paintings were hiding. A while after spotting the first painting, Kenneth and I found a second near the main branch of the Columbus Metropolitan Library. I found a map through the Columbus Public Art website, but wasn't able to make the time to go and find each painting until our last week in Columbus (there's also a list of the all the street addresses and artists here, from Wall With A View).

Kenneth and I found fifteen of the twenty plein air paintings (since they were made two years ago, we were pretty pleased with our final count). Plein air is French for "in open air," plein air paintings are made outdoors, on site. I've always wanted to try plein air painting, I've even watched some painters work in the gardens at Franklin Park - it looks like fun!

I tried my best to photograph each painting with the scene the artist was depicting. It's neat to see how some areas of downtown have changed in just two years. We had fun looking for all of the murals, it felt like a scavenger hunt! I'll miss not seeing these paintings often (especially the one below, it's the first one I saw and the one I saw almost every day for two years), but I'm excited to look for new public art in Cincinnati!

Check out all of the public art I've seen in Columbus here!