Readers split on Richard Serra’s “Twain”

ABOVE: Inside Serra's Twain looking East to Citygarden and the Arch

I didn’t appreciate “Twain” until after Citygarden opened and I spent more time in the area. Sure, I’d driven and walked passed it many times but I had never ventured across the grass.  I’ve learned my wheelchair does a decent job on grass and, after getting up close to Twain and passing through the passageways, I now have a love affair with the sculpture.

Here are the results of last week’s poll:

Q: Which best describes your thoughts on the Gateway Mall block w/Richard Serra’s ‘Twain’ sculpture?

1. Get rid of Twain ASAP. 104 [43%]
2. Like Twain but the block is too bare, needs more art & activities. 63 [26%]
3. I don’t hate Twain but I’m not crazy about it either. 37 [15%]
4. Like Twain and the minimal surroundings, just needs new sidewalks, etc 26 [11%]
5. Love Twain, don’t change that block at all. 7 [3%]
6. Other answer… 4 [2%]
7. Unsure/no opinion. 1 [0%]

While the biggest block (43%) favors removal of Twain that means a small majority are at least okay with it staying.

As I thought, readers would not be short of opinions on Twain.  One example shared by others:

I’ve always felt that Twain – an interesting piece in of itself – is simply in the wrong venue. Had this same reviled installation been originally placed in Laumeier Sculpture Park, it would likely be valued (even lauded) lauded today as an environmental work. I think we could do right by both Serra and the city by relocating Twain to Laumeier and expanding Citygarden into that space.

Twain was designed for the current site, not a suburban park.  Moving the piece would destroy it.

SERRA’S “TILTED ARC” in Federal Plaza, New York, angered workers in adjacent federal office buildings because it runs, 120 feet long and 12 feet high, across part of a much-used square. The obligatory detour around it, and its confrontational scale and placement in a city where pedestrians cherish the little open space they can get, makes it vulnerable to the charge that while it may be imposing as sculpture, it is insensitive as urban design.

“Tilted Arc” is seriously threatened with removal, and in St. Louis Alderman Timothy J. Dee of the 17th Ward has introduced a bill that would put it up to the voters to decide if “Twain” should be removed from city property. A simple majority would do it next Aug. 5 if the proposition gets on the ballot. “A whole lot of people want it moved,” Dee said.

Former Alderman Dee’s bill wasn’t approved by the Board of Aldermen.  Public art should never be the subject of a vote at the polls.  The work was designed for this site and no other, moving it would destroy it.

ABOVE: Construction of "Twain" in 1981. Photo by Robert Pettus, used with permission

As you can see from the above image the context in 1981 was rather bleak. The idea was to get glimpses of the city through the openings.  You cannot appreciate “Twain” from the street or even from the sidewalk. I recently sat with Amy Broadway of the Pulitzer Foundation for the Arts as we watched a 1986 documentary clip on “Twain.”  It included interviews with Serra himself.  He explained how he wanted you to be free to approach from any direction, hence no paths. He wanted you to see the city differently. While I was there I experienced Serra’s “Joe:”

ABOVE: "Joe" by Richard Serra

“The urban works need a large number of people to complete their content. (I feel strongly that these sculptures could not be in a dessert)  They need the interaction of people.”
- Richard Serra

Here is a little video clip I made of “Twain:”

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9nWOLmkr_Kk

Tomorrow I will outline suggestions for physical improvements to the block.  Thanks to photographer Robert Pettus for the permission to use his image.

- Steve Patterson