The MFA Art + Social Practice emphasis at Otis College of Art and Design is hosting a new flag on campus. Part of Pledges of Allegiance, a nationwide public art project by Creative Time, a commisioned flag from photographer and mixed-media artist Vik Muniz is currently on view outside of the Bronya and Andy Galef Center for Fine Arts. Otis College is one of 19 cultural institutions and universities across 16 states to raise the flag.
Muniz’s Diaspora Cloud features a cloud floating against a blue background, evoking a geographically and temporally dispersed public that nevertheless share a similar viewpoint. The flag cleverly cites Clouds, his Creative Time project from 2001. In the public art project, clouds were “drawn” over the Manhattan skyline by a crop-dusting plane re-worked for skywriting. Muniz uses the sky as a metaphor for the ephemerality of connection within a community.
Each flag embodies art’s ability to channel political passion, providing a unifying symbol around which to unite, as well as a call-to-action for institutions nationwide to raise upcoming Pledges of Allegiance flags in solidarity with Creative Time.
Muniz’s flag will be raised across the following 19 locations:
- Creative Time Headquarters - 59 E 4th St, New York, NY
- 21C Museum Hotel Durham - 111 Corcoran St, Durham, NC
- Blue Star Contemporary - 116 Blue Star, San Antonio, TX
- John Nicholas Brown Center for Public Humanities and Cultural Heritage, Brown University - 357 Benefit Street, Providence, RI
- Bruce Museum of Arts and Science - 1 Museum Dr, Greenwich, CT
- City of Bloomington, Indiana - Seminary Park, 546 S College Avenue; City Hall, 401 N Morton Street; and Rosehill Cemetery, 1100 W 4th Street, Bloomington, IN
- Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University - 114 Central Ave, Ithaca, NY
- KMAC Museum - 715 W Main St, Louisville, KY
- Mid-America Arts Alliance - 2018 Baltimore Ave, Kansas City, MO
- Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit - 4454 Woodward Ave, Detroit, MI
- Otis College of Art and Design, MFA Art + Social Practice - 9045 Lincoln Blvd, Los Angeles, CA
- RISD Museum - 224 Benefit Street, Providence, RI
- Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University - 71 Hamilton Street, New Brunswick, NJ
- SPACE - 536 Congress Street, Portland, ME
- Texas State Galleries - 233 West Sessom Drive, San Marcos, TX
- The Union for Contemporary Art - 2423 N 24th Street, Omaha, NE
- The Commons, in partnership with the Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas - 1340 Jayhawk Blvd, Lawrence, KS
- University of South Florida Contemporary Art Museum - 3821 USF Holly Dr, Tampa, FL
- Wassaic Project - 37 Furnace Bank Road, Wassaic, NY
- The final Pledges of Allegiance flag by Josephine Meckseper will be raised on July 3.
Pledges of Allegiance aims to inspire a sense of community among cultural institutions, beginning with an urgent articulation of the political demands of the moment. Each flag points to an issue the artist is passionate about or a cause they believe is worth fighting for and speaks to how we might move forward collectively as a country. To inaugurate the project, Creative Time raised Marilyn Minter’s RESIST FLAG on the roof of its headquarters on Flag Day, June 14. Pledges of Allegiance was originally conceived by Alix Browne and developed in collaboration with Cian Browne, Fabienne Stephan, and Opening Ceremony. Learn more.
Top image: Vik Muniz, Diaspora Cloud, 2017. Photo by Nicholas Prakas. Courtesy of Creative Time.