Public art ‘Open House’ in Oshawa for $145,000 Urban Square sculpture

Three art works short-listed for a $145,000 public art piece to grace Oshawa’s downtown Bond Simcoe Urban Square will be in the public eye next week at a public art open house.

Residents will get a chance to learn more about the artworks which have been proposed for the Urban Square centennial project, with the short-listed artists presenting their proposals to the public.

The public art piece, the city’s first independent sculpture commission, signifies a “significant step” toward enhancing the creative fabric of the downtown at the square, a project that has been high on the wish list since the city expropriated the empty parking lot in the summer of 2022.

The Urban Square, located at the north-east corner of Simcoe and Bond streets, will host community celebrations and events bringing “vitality and excitement to the downtown.”

The artwork, commissioned as part of the city’s centennial celebrations with a budget of $145,000 (including artist fees, engineering, materials and installation), is the result of a cross-country call for expressions of interest from artists in creating and installing a large-scale public sculpture in downtown Oshawa.

Three artists have been shortlisted for the project: Brandon Vickery, Nicholas Crombach and an artist group made up Simon Frank, Gary Barwin and Tor Lukasik-Foss. All three short-listed artists bring plenty of experience in large scale art projects.

• Vickerd, a sculptor whose site-specific interventions, public performances and object-based sculptures act as a catalyst for critical thought and engagement with the physical world, won a public art installation commission in Kingston in 2021, with his “dynamic and playful” sculptures The Wilds of Kingston gracing a prominent downtown intersection. Vickerd, who is a Professor of Sculpture at York University, where he chairs the Visual Art and Art History department, has presented his work across Canada in Ottawa, Calgary, Thunder Bay, Edmonton and Hamilton.
• Crombach is an artist working in Kingston who is the recipient of numerous grants and awards including the Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation Award. He has presented solo exhibitions in Canada, London, and Berlin.
• Barwin, Frank and Lukasik-Foss were commissioned to create Belongings, a series of ten bronze-cast suitcases situated in different locations along the length of a recently re-configured pedestrian pathway in Hamilton’s Churchill Park. The suitcases revealed narrative or symbolic references to travel, escape, refuge, emigration, as well as a subtle acknowledgement to Raoul Wallenberg, the Swedish architect who assisted thousands of Jews to escape Nazi-occupied Hungary during World War II. The commission was valued at $200,000 and was installed in late 2019.

A public jury will be reviewing the proposals before recommending the winning artwork, which will be installed in 2026.

“The Urban Square and its artwork reflect the city’s commitment and desire to connect and engage with the community,” the city said in a news release, “and transform the spaces where we live, work, learn and play into vibrant, inviting and meaningful public spaces.”

Construction of the Bond Simcoe Urban Square – the new “focal point” planned for Oshawa’s downtown – is set to begin in the next couple of months after council approved a $2.487 million contract for the signature project in the heart of the city.

Hawkins Contracting Services of Stouffville, with a resume that includes more than three dozen similar in scope projects in the GTA over the past dozen years, turned in the lowest qualified bid for the project at $2.227 million, plus another $254,677 for optional work on curbs, sewers and gutters and boulevards.

Phase One of the project, with work scheduled for “early spring,” will include:

• Demolition and removals
• Site excavation
• Site servicing
• Hardscape installation
• Site furnishings
• Softscape installation or planting
• Site lighting installation

Phase Two will include the public art installation.

The public art Open House will be held Tuesday, February 25 at 6:30 p.m. at the Arts Resources Centre at 45 Queen Street.

To learn more about Public Art in Oshawa, visit oshawa.ca/PublicArt.

One of the whimsical sculptures that make up Brandon Vickerd’s ‘Wilds of Kingston’ sculptures in downtown Kingston