I think it's on.

Okay, I'd like to call the meeting to order.

And Elijah, would you read the role?

Epic is absent.

Hannaford here.

Murphy.

Corolla Titus.

And Newton is absent.

Has everybody had a chance to uh read the Oh no.

First let me say are there any changes or additions to the agenda?

Um no changes.

We do have PowerPoints for agenda items six A and six B.

Okay.

Are there any members of the community here who would like to come up and speak?

Apparently not.

Um has everybody had a chance to look at the minutes of the last meeting?

Yes.

Yes.

Any uh discussion or is there a motion to approve the minutes?

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

A second?

Good because there's only two of you here.

Um anyway.

Um so um do I have any so then uh any YAs?

Yes.

I think it's the first meeting of in where it's only three of us.

That's why I think I'm uh I'm I'm a little confused.

I've been to several that way.

Okay, so um have all the communities uh see, we already did the minutes, so um we're ready for their presentations.

So Sarah, do you want to so this is um starting our administrative reports for agenda item high clay?

Um six A, which is a review of the temporary land art initiative, nature culture, um, and the finalists.

So as a reminder, nature culture is a temporary rotating exhibition series that's part of our temporary public art program.

It invites artists to create site responsive installations in parks across the city of Napa.

The intent is for these exhibitions to investigate the relationships between ecology and art.

The first edition will be held in the Oxpo Preserve, and it will be installed between the period of fall 2026 through to spring of 2029.

The goals of this project are to create exciting, appealing, and harmonious public environments to uplift new voices and perspectives on nature and climate issues through art to promote public participation and interaction with artists and artwork, and to encourage the use and appreciation of Napa's park system.

Our selection panel used the following criteria to select the finalists of the RFQ.

This included their design portfolio, a letter of interest, and artist qualifications.

The Oxbow Preserve is one of Napa's many parks, and the art walk will be located in zones one, two, three, and five of the Oxbow Preserve.

This ensures that the art walk is fully accessible along an ADA approved path and also keeps the wilderness areas of the park reserved for wilderness.

And with that, I will introduce you to our finalists.

The first finalists are an artist duo, Delia DeVer and Chris Um and Christy Moya.

Both DeVert and Moya have roots in the Bay Area, and Christy Moya is a long-term current resident of Napa.

Moya is a photographer and filmmaker, and DeVer is a basket weaver, and together they propose a large-scale burden basket inspired by baskets from their shared Chiricawa Apache heritage.

It will incorporate overlapping cultural references from contemporary and traditional Western and native sources.

They propose that it will be made out of river willow and will incorporate cyanotype photography.

In their proposal, Christy Moya says, in the canon between dreams and peril, there is tangible faith.

A basket is tangible faith, an icon of devotion.

The weaver imagines her basket, gathers the materials, and as her hands work, she sings to the plants gathered, she sings to the form that emerges to the use that will nurture her people.

The next artist is Mia Fuhr.

Mia is a professor of sculpture originally from Canada, but currently based in the Bay Area for the last 15 years.

Her practice has long centered on questions surrounding ecology, climate change, and our relationship to the more than human world.

Early projects emerged from field research in Alberta's tar sands strip mines and in the coastal Louisiana bayous.

She says that witnessing the fragility of northern ecosystems firsthand deepened her understanding of the profound interconnectedness of environmental systems and human activity.

She says that this program, Nature Culture, she is interested in creating a work that enters into a dialogue with the place rather than imposing itself upon it, and would begin with on site research.

She also states that material choice will be important to her process, choosing materials that are durable enough to withstand outdoor conditions while remaining sensitive to the ecological character of the site.

She says she's interested in how sculpture can alternatively reveal itself and disappear into the landscape, shifting between contrast and camouflage depending on the season, weather, light, and vantage point.

She's also interested in creating sculptural forms that make unseen ecological relationships visible.

The next selected artist is Packard Jennings.

Packard Jennings is a celebrated Bay Area based artist and teacher of art whose recent work follows two interlocking themes the history and ongoing consequences of anthropocentrism, which he defines as the misguided belief that humans are separate from and superior to the rest of nature.

For Napa, Jennings proposes a continuation of his series that he created for the city of Emeryville, which was four sculptural bird habitats.

For Napa, he proposes an adaptation of a Roman triumphal column, which would be engraved with a visual story informed by WAPO and Putwin images and symbols.

At the column's crown, a network of fabricated branches would extend outward in the stylized form of a nest for osprey, a species that is intimately tied to the health of the riparian ecosystem.

It would be made out of sustainably sourced aquoia wood and would be designed in consultations with ornithologists to be functional as an osprey nesting habitat.

The final artist is Songmen Yu, who is a sculpture who creates work using organic and reclaimed materials.

She holds an MFA in studio art from UC Davis and California State University.

She has exhibited work at institutions across the US and South Korea, such as the Morris Graves Museum of Art, the Holter Museum, Fort Mentor Fort Mason Center, and the M Museum.

Now based in the Bay Area, she would approach nature culture using materials from the site and allowing the environment itself to guide the work.

Having spent considerable time in the Napa Valley, she is particularly drawn to California Buckeye, Western Redwood, Thistle, and Wild Fennel.

She has incorporated these and many other organic materials into life-size sculptures that reflect both the beauty and fragility of the environment.

Yu is also interested in developing a site-specific performance in dialogue with the installation, creating a dynamic experience that encourages visitors to engage physically and emotionally with the environment.

She says, through sculpture, installation, and performance, I hope to create an experience that invites reflection, curiosity, and a deeper sense of responsibility toward the environment we all share.

Nature Culture, Art in the Open is supported by the general fund, and the budget is estimated to be approximately $30,000.

The program costs include the artist stipend, signage, marketing, and staff costs.

So the finalists are currently in the process of creating their proposals.

Those proposals are due back September 1st, after which time the selection panel will meet again to review those proposals and select which artists they would like to avo uh award the production budget.

Once those production budgets have been awarded and contracts have been executed, the artists will begin their production period and would install their work as early as October of 2026 and as late as September, uh spring of 2027.

Um and the full exhibit would open no later than spring of 2027.

That concludes our presentation for item 6A.

And there are no motions for us to do, right?

No motions, just a report.

So anybody have any questions or discussion on this specifically about this work?

Uh yeah.

I think I answered my own question.

I was looking at the duration of the project, knowing that some of these are are going to be sure it's a temporary effort.

Well, I know it's a temporary effort.

I was uh curious given you know the weathering that might occur there.

So that was the only thing that I was wondering about.

Especially the baskets, I was curious how those might stand up in the winter, you know.

Yeah, we did a site visit with Christie um just last week, and that's also something that we are considering, and we did say in the RFQ and RFP documents that we would allow the work to change over time.

Um that said we don't want any work to become a hazard to the public or to totally lose its character.

Um and Christy kindly reminded me that Apache Basket, she has Apache baskets that are over 300 years old.

So I I actually did want to make a comment because I'm familiar with some of these artists, by the way.

And um they knew going into it what materials they're gonna use, and that they're gonna be outdoors.

And I use some of those kind of things myself for some of my uh three-dimensional pieces.

And yeah.

And a good example is that.

And I just went to Yosemite about two uh months ago, and when I was at the at their exhibit in the museum thing, they also had some stuff outdoors that was about 400 years old.

And they were baskets to some of those baskets where there were two of them that were actually been outside for over 200 years.

So yeah, so they know what they're doing.

Um the only comment I want to add is those are those are real strong strong candidates.

I'm really pleased.

Out of the uh four, you're gonna pick how many?

Um we do, so if you'll recall from the first presentation on this project, we had initially put out the call to artists using a tier system, and the artists could apply to varying levels of production budget.

So the lowest being, I believe a thousand dollars and then three thousand and then five thousand.

And the selection panel chose um artists that feasibly could all be selected to produce their work.

And so they did choose four artists for tier three with the appreciation that you know, for a two-year exhibition, six thousand dollars total, which includes a thousand for for responding to the RFP, and then five thousand production budget is quite low.

Um, so they wanted to give these artists, they wanted to choose very strong artists and artists that uh could do something great with that budget.

So feasibly, all four artists could be selected to move forward to create their artwork.

And and three of them are quite established, so I absolutely know what they're doing.

Um this is for my own edification uh because I'm bringing the megalithic.

Because I'm a fairly new to the committee.

Um what is the um what's the selection uh committee look like and how is that determined, just for me to understand.

The selection panels are different for uh all of our projects for permanent public art pieces.

We typically include one to two members of the public art steering committee for temporary projects like uh nature culture, which is not subject to the requirements of the public art fund.

We um we do we do often include a member of the public art steering committee, but it's made up of different professionals who have relevant experience to that project.

So this time we had um we had a working artist, we had uh a member of the Suskell Indigenous sorry intertribal council, we also had um an expert on ecology, and then another person with experience in arts.

That's great, thank you for that background.

So I didn't really there was nobody from the public art student committee on this one.

Yeah, Laura.

Oh, okay, good.

I just want to make sure there was one.

I was wondering uh the uh you said something related to uh with the birdhouse, something was Whippu inspired.

Or did I misunderstood that?

Yes, I think um, and I can go back to Packard Jennings' slides.

So you can see he's using a Quia wood, and these are both renderings and the existing bird houses along the Emeryville Greenway, and he uses um, I believe a CNC machining process to create patterns, and his uh proposal, which may shift during this proposal development phase, is to create a Roman triumphal column.

And if you're familiar with like Trajan's column, it's engraved with uh symbology and stories, and I think those stories he proposes would be related to the stories from Wapo and Pupin people.

Uh, very interesting.

Is that too uh is it to offset the uh Apache inspired uh other art or not and nothing to do with anything?

Um not necessarily to offset it, but um, I think it being land art, uh we've been um aware of the history of land art, particularly in the US in you know, from the 1960s and 70s being predominantly white men using nature as a blank canvas rather than um looking to traditions of land art that are created in association and in deep relationship with the land.

And so when these artists were thinking about relationships with the land, I think naturally they either wanted to or in their practice already engage with the native peoples that um help to create such this this really beautiful place that we call home.

Thank you.

Um ready for Bes.

I think that's where you can spy okay.

Hi, um I'm Vienne de Santiago, and I'm gonna be presenting for 6B on the general public art updates.

So a little introduction about myself.

I am Sarah's intern for the summer for public art.

I graduated from California State University Sacramento in December, and I got my bachelor's in studio art, my certificate in curatorial studies, and my minor in art history.

And currently I am working on a curatorial project back in Sacramento, and it is uh exhibition called Smash.

And I co-curate it with Bridget Rexford, and it's a traveling exhibition about the craftsmanship and the art of pinatas.

We recently exhibited at the Crocker for a one-day exhibition with their festival that they recently had, and we'll be back there next year too.

So yeah.

So for our first update, we relocated the loudspeaker to in front of the Goodman Library, and we also recently cleaned around it and did the art inspection for it while also buffing and polishing it.

And then we also recently did uh deinstallation and installation of cycles two, where cycles three was previously held.

And yeah, this one artwork was made by Peter Hansen, and it was a part of the Napa Art Walk, and now there's Cycles 2 here.

And then these are for the Fourth of July banners that were up at Main Street.

Which are they still which have been recently taken down?

But these were the 10 selected banners that were shown.

And then these are our upcoming public art events for the fall.

We have a talk and illustrated history of public art, a workshop for the Dia de los Muertos, banner making, a tour of circulations and weavers, and then a tour of second street art corridor.

And then other updates we have is the second street pavement art scheduling to be installed mid late August, sculpture relocations, two-phase projects starting with the immigrants, currently in design development, and then community events.

We are working on the Napa Light Art Festival and the Dia de los Muertos.

Thank you.

Hopefully the cars will be back.

Just wanted to add it's irrelevant, but I graduated from California State University Sacramento as well.

Oh nice.

Got my master's degree, and I was also involved in curating when I was up there.

So that's great.

I love that place.

Yeah, it's very it's very nice.

I like it there.

Um the cars, we are planning on having them back.

Um we're also looking at other public art elements to incorporate.

So last year we had, or sorry, two years ago we had um giant La Catrina's um by the artist Ricardo Soltero, who has recently retired.

Um and then last year we incorporated the car altars.

We hope to incorporate both again this year and a new public art element, TBD.

Well, it was one of the coolest things I've seen downtown, so it was awesome.

Is that conclude our talks?

Does um is there any comments or uh discussion by the committee?

No.

From me.

I had one comment.

Um so a couple of our meetings were actually launches of new artworks, which I think are I I think it's really important for us to attend those.

But I feel like we missed the bead on being able to connect as as a group there.

It's more of like a handshaking kind of moment and like celebratory, which I love.

But um I wonder if that if we can set a cadence up where even when those things happen, we can still get together and talk about these topics.

I don't know if that's a shared feeling amongst the rest of the crew, but uh it has been me and Garrett usually go together at those things.

I'm usually there too, yeah.

There's just a brown neck thing, right?

That also we have to keep in mind.

Exactly.

That's why I was thinking it would, you know, even though going to those is super valuable, and I think we should all be committed to that.

Um I still feel like maybe we should still get together and talk about the topics as they move forward because there's a trajectory and you know, in order for us to be able to, you know, provide comment and be a part of engaged in the process if we miss two months in a row because we're doing launches instead of these sessions.

I would say launches in addition to would not bother me.

I think I don't think we've ever stopped having a meeting for a launch.

I mean for the Fuller Park um celebration.

Yeah, those um celebrations typically are not in lieu of the meetings.

Um the only reason why we didn't have the meeting last month's because we didn't have quorum.

Right.

But typically we try to hold a meeting every single month.

Uh we talked about that at the beginning of the year of kind of even like this evening when we don't have as many like um be voting items that we still want to hold meeting, give you updates on all the projects that we're working on.

And then um we do, I think it's November and May.

We took those off because they fall on kind of holidays.

Um and it's typical previous years we've done December and July because of the the holidays or traveling and that sort of thing.

Um, but we are trying to keep a good cadence of of meetings to keep everyone updated and be able to have even at this given time in the meeting if there's things that need to be brought up, we can discuss those things if needed.

Also, to be clear, that wasn't a big criticism or anything like that.

It's more um me learning how to you know interact and and I have to say we we have changed so there was a period where kind of start with COVID, but I mean there was a period where we were gonna only meet when there was an actionable item, and then we all got agreed that for a co cohesive team we really need to meet every month.

And I so I really appreciate that you guys held this meeting.

Yes.

And to me, this was very valuable, valuable to see and also for us to be able to discuss it.

I do, and I want to address your other point.

I do think unbeknownst even the additional comments you added to it.

I think it's important that we go to openings of things and not not show up.

So I I do think it's important, and I even think it's kind of one of our responsibilities is which is beyond just meeting for these meetings, but when we have an artist that's gonna have an opening or where a new thing like Second Street's gonna open or any of those kind of things, I think we should be down there all of us.

I don't think we should necessarily talk about the projects per se that we step on any toes of any brown act kind of stuff where we start.

Because you can't help but start talking about business and stuff.

But I mean certainly it's not against Brown Act to have coffee together or something and and be together, you know, and walk around together even.

And I like meeting.

And I've enjoyed the times that me and Garrett have gone together.

Anything's now.

It's been nice.

Yeah, I agree.

And and and also um Julie has been there too.

So I'll just mention I think the Napa Historical Society is planning um in celebration of the relocation of the loudspeaker.

I believe they're pro uh they're preparing a loudspeaker appreciation day.

Um so keep an eye out for that.

I think uh they're looking at mid-August, but I'll definitely send you that information when I'm gonna see that for us.

And I do want to say, because I thought everybody in Napa had seen that, you know.

And um I've had friends who was so I'm kind of glad because I was kind of pushing having it where it is and uh had the good one.

I've had a whole bunch of friends say, John, there's this the loudspeaker was invented Napa.

And I'm going, yeah.

Um and it's been in White Mary Plaza, like you know, like about 150 feet from where you're looking at it for about 25 or whatever years it is.

It's interesting to me that many, many more people are seeing it, and and I wasn't expecting that because I thought Dwight Murray Plaza was a very public place that we do things.

And then my last little thing will be a question is Dwight Marie Plaza gone?

We let we let it was sold.

Let them have that big building.

It was sold to the developer.

And I will not make comments on that.

Uh if there's no more comments or any more comments, then I call for the meeting to be adjourned.