Pittsburgh Shows Off New Public Art Projects in Advance of NFL Draft

This is one of Ice’s two installations at 144 Smithfield Street, the former home of the Frank & Seder department store, which opened in 1918 and has sat empty on and off for decades. Aurora V2, an updated version of a previous public art project, is made up of a curtain of polycarbonate diamonds hanging from a frame, which are lit from behind and rustle in a breeze created by programmed fans.

Ice told Pittsburgh’s NPR affiliate WESA that he “dreamed up” Light Work (Night Shift), also installed at the former Frank & Cedar Building on Smithfield Street, as a work in which the architecture is “growing and duplicating and kind of taking over the space in a way.” The materials (TV monitors, mirrors, windows, neon elements) were all salvaged, he said, much of it on-site from the abandoned building.

Two installations by Brill are on view in storefronts along the Frank & Cedar Building’s Fifth Avenue side, around the corner from the main entrance on Smithfield. Broadcast was inspired by playing with blocks with his toddler, and is about larger communities functioning as interconnected, evolving systems.

“This work kind of just depicts how I feel my brain would look as a regional map, if you will,” jones told WESA. Her two-part, Keith Haring–esque mural is painted on wooden panels affixed to facing storefronts on the 300 blocks of Third Avenue and Boulevard of the Allies.

Gonnella’s colorful murals enliven an unlovely block of Smithfield Street with images referencing recognizable Pittsburgh icons like Igloo, the Pittsburgh Penguins’ ice skating mascot; Clark Bars, the underrated peanut-and-toffee candy bar that was invented in Pittsburgh; the late Teenie Harris, a well-known Black photographer; and an homage to chipped chopped ham from the beloved deli Isaly’s.

Three sculptures by Clark are installed in front of the Heinz 57 Building, an office building that housed various department stores throughout most of the 20th century.

This piece was created by i/thee, a collective of three experimental artists (Kristina Fisher, Neal Lucas Hitch, and Martin Hitch). For Seasons transforms an empty storefront at the base of a parking garage into an interaction installation. Window decals made from temperature-sensitive vinyl will change color in response to the weather and human contact, shifting between shades of blues and purples depending on the environment.

Lowery’s interactive window installation adorns a mixed-used building half a block from the Allegheny River in the Downtown Cultural District.