Breakenridge: Policy change should grow appreciation of public art – Calgary Herald

As the Bowfort Towers public art project sinks deeper into a morass of controversy and confusion, overshadowing the completion of the very interchange it adorns, a glimmer of hope has emerged that some sanity and common sense might ultimately prevail on this matter.

Calgary’s public art furor did not begin with the bizarre concoction of beams and rocks at Bowfort Road and 16th Avenue N.W., but it appears to be the tipping point. And as word emerged last week of a growing consensus on city council to find a better way of selecting and approving public art, there was further back-pedalling and finger pointing on this most recent subject of public scorn.

Despite suggestions from the city last month that the project was meant to incorporate Blackfoot symbolism, a statement released Thursday by Mayor Naheed Nenshi — and also signed by the Treaty 7 chiefs — claims Bowfort Towers was “never intended to be an Indigenous artwork, nor inspired by Indigenous themes.”