ART NOTES : Sculpting a Garden of Scholarly Delight : An ambitious project at Pasadena City College has been turned into something more, thanks to the vision of New York artist Jody Pinto.

By Suzanne Muchnic

Dec. 24, 1995 12 AM PT

Suzanne Muchnic is The Times' art writer

Scrapping plans for a traditional sculpture garden to realize the vision of a contemporary artist, Pasadena City College has commissioned Jody Pinto to design a $1-million project in the center of the campus. The New York artist’s proposed work--to be built on a 79,000-square-foot parcel of land currently used as a parking lot--includes an elevated plaza, an amphitheater, a water channel and landscaped grounds where sculptures by other artists can be displayed. Construction is scheduled to begin early next year.

Pinto describes her design as “an open, flexible stage” that can be adapted to fit the college’s needs.

“As an artist who works primarily with urban environments, I was drawn to the idea of designing a sculpture garden,” she says. “I thought about the concept of a sculpture garden and what it could mean at a school, particularly at a community college.”

With two dozen public artworks to her credit, completed during the past 20 years, Pinto is known for designing user-friendly urban spaces and parks with functional elements--including pedestrian bridges, seating and children’s play areas.

“The field of sculpture is moving toward urban planning,” says Pinto, whose extensive resume includes serving as a consultant on St. Louis’ light rail system and designing a two-mile streetscape in Phoenix.

The Pasadena project offered her an opportunity to create art that could become part of college life, so she conceived of “a garden of activities” that would change constantly with the people who use it and events that take place there. “I like the idea that classes can move out into the garden and the amphitheater can be a platform for collaborations,” she says.

Formally conceived as a constellation, the plan is dominated by two circular structures--the amphitheater and plaza--which can be used for performances, meetings and festivities. A 450-foot cascading channel of water, symbolizing a life force, will connect the two facilities, she says. A wall alongside the channel will give students a place to sit and dip their feet in the water, while pathways will provide access through landscaped areas. At night, the garden will be dramatically transformed by lighting.

The artwork is part of the final phase of the college’s $100-million renovation. Initial plans called for something akin to UCLA’s Franklin D. Murphy Sculpture Garden, so Henry Hopkins, chairman of the UCLA art department and director of the UCLA/Armand Hammer Art Museum, was called in as a consultant.

“I had the unhappy task of explaining that the kinds of sculptures at UCLA have become incalculably expensive and that most of them are already in collections,” he says. “Then I made a counterproposal for something that would be more open, contemporary and trenchant.”

His idea was to make the garden a stage for temporary installations of sculpture by a changing array of artists. But after a committee of art professionals and college representatives was assembled to develop the plan, Hopkins’ concept evolved into a competition for a major work by a single artist.

The committee compiled a list of 30 contenders, then reduced it to six artists who submitted proposals. Three finalists--Pinto, Judd Fine and Doug Hollis--eventually built models and made presentations to the committee. It was Pinto’s balance of artistry and function that won the committee’s unanimous support, Hopkins says. “The choice was just automatic.” The college’s board of trustees unanimously approved the project.

Ambitious as it is, this is not Pinto’s biggest work. Neither is it her only project in Southern California. She also has been commissioned to help architects, engineers and landscapers in a redesign and refurbishment of the Santa Monica State Beach and Palisades Park. But the Pasadena garden looms large on her horizon.

“One of the most compelling reasons for doing what I do is that each project presents a different challenge. I have to grow and become even more of an explorer than I was before,” she says. “This one should be a lot of fun. I anticipate interacting with the faculty and students. That’s what will bring this project to life.”

To build the garden Pinto will work with Gruen Associates, architect of the college’s new Shatford Library. Funds for the project are being raised by the Pasadena City College Foundation.

NEW YEAR FAIRS: Get out your 1996 calendars. Two art fairs are scheduled for Jan. 12-14, with previews on successive nights.

Now in its fifth year, photography dealer Stephen Cohen’s popular “Photo L.A.” will feature displays by 38 photography galleries and private dealers from a dozen cities, at Butterfield & Butterfield in Hollywood. Special events include collecting seminars, lectures by photographers Marc Riboud and Luis Gonzalez Palma, and an exhibition, “pursuing the undocumentable,” curated by Sue Spaid.

A $35-a-ticket preview reception will be held Jan. 11, 6-9 p.m. for the benefit of DIFFA/Photographers+Friends United Against AIDS, a community fund for AIDS services. To order preview tickets, call (310) 652-6601. Public hours for the fair are Jan. 12, 3-8 p.m.; Jan. 13, noon-7 p.m.; Jan. 14, noon-6 p.m. Information: (213) 937-5482.

Concurrently, the second annual “Works on Paper/LA” will assemble the wares of 75 dealers at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium. Participants will show a vast array of prints, watercolors and drawings. Additional attractions include “The Image of Women in Art, 15th Century to Now,” an exhibition curated by Josine Ianco Starrels, a show of Chicano art from Self-Help Graphics and a lecture on “Virtual Reality and the Art of the Original Print” by artist June Wayne, Jan. 14, 10 a.m.

The “Works on Paper” preview, also priced at $35 a ticket, will be held on Jan. 12, 6-9 p.m. Public hours are Jan. 13, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. and Jan. 14, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Information: (310) 455-2886.

HOLIDAY BONANZA: The first issue of the Art Matters Catalog of artist-designed gifts has been a raging success. Although it was launched in an saturated market, during an economic slump, the mail-order catalog had racked up more than $1 million in sales by mid-December. Apparently unconventional holiday shoppers like the fact that proceeds will fund grants to emerging artists from the Art Matters Foundation in New York--as well as the catalog’s zany selection of gifts.

So what are the big sellers? A $35 cardboard chair made of recycled paper by Oliver Lebloise, a $52 charm bracelet jam-packed with junk by Jim Reva and two coffee mugs--one emblazoned with “Art Matters,” the other designed by Karen Finley with the message “Plain Mean.”

PARK ART: Conservators Glenn Wharton and Rosa Lowinger are taking a close-up, professional look at 30 city-owned sculptures in Lincoln Park and MacArthur Park. The objects of their attention range from a 1926 likeness of Abraham Lincoln by Julia Bracken Wendt and monuments to Mexico’s struggle for independence to works by Luis Jimenez, George Herms and other contemporary artists, installed in the 1980s as part of a public art program.

Under terms of a $15,000 city-funded contract with Urban Art, Inc., a nonprofit Los Angeles-based organization that supports public art, the team already has surveyed the sculptures. Wharton and Lowinger are now preparing a condition report and cost estimate for treatment, restoration and continuing maintenance. The conservators also will clean the sculptures and conduct training sessions on sculpture maintenance for personnel in the city’s Recreation and Parks Department.

The project is an outgrowth of a nationwide initiative, SOS! (Save Outdoor Sculpture), organized by the National Institute for the Conservation of Cultural Property in cooperation with the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American Art.

DIGITAL NEWS: Tired of flying toasters and iridescent fish? If your taste runs more to luminous landscapes and you like a little music with your art, Trident Software, Inc. has a computer screensaver for you. “Artscreens: The Impressionists Collection,” created in cooperation with the National Gallery of Art in Washington, features 40 Impressionist works in the gallery’s collection, accompanied by classical music. The digitized images can be programmed to rotate at designated intervals while your computer is not in use. As the Monets, Renoirs, Lautrecs and Cassatts roll across your screen, you’ll hear excerpts of works by Chopin, Debussy, Faure, Franck, Liszt and Satie. Priced at $26.95, the new product is available at local software dealers, via mail by calling (310) 322-5900 or from Trident at (703) 243-0303.