Close, Closer, Closest is an in-progress project located in Toledo, Ohio, in a small neighborhood.  It’s an old neighborhood, and the neighborhood surrounds a park. It’s called Close Park, and it’s a unique shape–a curving shape, and roads go around it, and it’s a very used park.  There’s a parochial school next to it that uses it as a playground–it’s always used: for games, picnicking, everything. And that’s the site. And the city wanted a small interactive piece of artwork for this park.

As I was doing my research on the area, I asked about the name Close. Close Park–what is that?  And nobody really knew. I think it is a family name from way back when, but that nobody really seemed to know is the main point.  

But it was interesting to me–I started thinking about the idea of being close.  How people would come to the park, and I imagined them moving from their houses, towards the park, being in the park, and being together.  And that’s how this concept of Close, Closer, Closest emerged.

The piece is a small garden.  It mimics the exact shape of the whole park.  It’s bisected by an existing concrete sidewalk.  And it’s like a little zen garden, with different plantings, some boulders, some limestone gravel.  And within this little zen garden, there are going to be poles: two-and-a-half inch diameter steel poles that are painted five different colors, at different heights, and there will be 350 of them.  They represent the houses that surround the park, the neighborhood houses, and the people that live in them, coming in together and occupying this park.

The poles are like fence posts, so they’ll have a cap. There’s an opportunity to put a time capsule element in, like a drawing or piece of paper, roll them up and put them in the pipes before they’re capped.  But basically it’s just a spacial field of elements and there will be pathways implied through them. There’s a circular kind of a landing off the sidewalk, a concrete landing that’s wheelchair accessible, so you can feel like you’re surrounded by these poles.  And they will just be experienced from different distances. From far off it’ll be this forest-like thing, and as you get closer, you’re in the space, that’s all it is.

The landscaping is done, except for the boulders.  The steel poles are being painted and are nearly done.  The timeline is, I ship these poles and I fly there to help set them within the next few weeks.

close closer closest, in progress, public art, Toledo