Art for All: Fort Wayne Public Art Master Plan

Art for All: Fort Wayne Public Art Master Plan

Fort Wayne, Indiana

Why

The City of Fort Wayne, Indiana is experiencing a significant amount of revitalization throughout the City, resulting in a significant investment in planning efforts. Because of this, the City adopted an ordinance requiring any private development receiving TIF incentives to contribute 1% of the project fee to the City of Fort Wayne’s Public Art Fund. In an effort to invest these dollars responsibly, the City set out to create a Public Art Master Plan. The plan is intended to direct spending to high priority projects both downtown and in neighborhoods, and to think critically about the needed infrastructure for creating a robust public art program.

How

Designing Local held over 100 stakeholder interviews to kick off the discovery phase and hosted a Public Art Pecha Kucha event to initiate the planning process. Six local artists and a nationally recognized curator spoke about the power of public art to a standing-room audience of 250 people The team will host several meetings to co-create ideas for the first projects that will result from this process. Each meeting will have a community-created public art piece that will culminate into a celebration of the entire city. The team also developed a custom built map program where participants can select where public art should go, where special stories happen, neighborhoods, and where public art currently exists.

What

Through the development of sound policy and a framework for implementation, the Fort Wayne Public Art Master Plan will offer the City an opportunity to inspire elected officials, private organizations, and residents to create public art strategies that are uniquely Fort Wayne.