Page 529 - Demo

On Baltic Street:BY MARTHA DOGGETTIn 1970, almost two blocks were cleared along Baltic Street between Fourth and Fifth Avenues to provide space for a replacement of P.S. 133, one of the oldest schools in New York City and one in need of major repair. Two years later, funds were cut off, and the lot became an eyesore and hazard for the community as trash accumulated.Convinced that the city did not intend to build quickly, area residents got together to turn part of the land into community gardens. Now, another community effort may ensure the use of a portion of the lot for a unique kind of sculpture.Called a question mark, a number nine, or an %u201c extraterresterial statement,%u201d depending on the viewpoint, the sculpture will be made of dirt, dug six feet into the ground. It will extend 78 feet by 42 feet, the size of a basketball court. A ramp will wind around the inside curve of the excavation, allowing visitors to explore the interior of the sculpture.The art work is the brainchild of Park Slope resident Oscar Yacilla, 34, a 1962 immigrant from Peru with a degree in fine arts from Manhattan%u2019s School of Visual Arts. %u2018%u2018This project will fulfill some of my ideas about art,%u201d says Yacilla. %u201c Art should not be elitist. There is a trend for art to be enshrined in a gallery somewhere. Art isn%u2019t a sacred object%u2014it passes with time.%u201dYacilla originally planned for the public to have free access to the excavation, to use and enjoy it as it pleased. City regulations, however, require that the project be surrounded by a fence and that a guard be on duty when the sculpture is open to the public. Yacilla expects the excavation to remain about two months.%u201d 1 think everyone will react in their own way,%u201d he says. %u2018%u2018Children will probably want to run through it very fast. I have been in that structure many times in my thoughts. One thing I%u2019d like to do is run in it. Sometimes I envision myself just sitting and contemplating.%u201d%u2018%u2018I%u2019m a utilitarian. I don%u2019t like to waste anything. It%u2019s very important for me that people aren%u2019t just spectators, that they experience the sculpture and its composition. Nothing will be used but the bare soil.%u201dIn Senate Race:Yacilla has approached several neighborhood groups in Park Slope for their support. %u201c Usually people are encouraging,%u201d he says. %u201c Some wonder who would want to spend $10,000 on something that is temporary. The people who don%u2019t like it usually don%u2019t have an understanding of what an aesthetic experience is.%u201dSUPPORTING THE SCULPTUREThe Park Slope Civic Council has offered to help with publicity costs and support in obtaining grants. Spokeswoman Helen Ann Tucker says, %u201c We were shown the plans. We like the look of the sculpture and we think it%u2019s a good temporary use of the space. He understands that when another use is found it will take priority. We felt in generalthere. This is really for the kids. We may have a fair when the sculpture opens. It would get everybody on the block involved.%u201dPerhaps the person most instrumental in helping Yacilla through the proper community channels is Seymour Gothelf, assistant principal at P.S. 133. %u201cI met Yacilla last April when he was recommended to me by a neighborhood person. I suggested he contact some neighborhood groups and referred him to a group in Bedford-Stuyvesant which specializes in proposal writing. He came back about three weeks ago to ask if I would help him contact the local Board of Education.Gothelf and Yacilla presented the project to Community Board 13surrounded by vacant land, by a desolate area. All steps that can be taken to make it more warm and human should be taken.%u201d SEEKING PRIVATE FUNDINGYacilla is currently seeking private funding for the project. Though current estimates run from $8,000 to $10,000, he says he hopes to work with the Brooklyn Arts and Culture Association in developing %u201c a more realistic estimate.%u201d He has also applied for a $6,500 state grant under the Creative Artists Public Service Program.Should the sculpture be completed, it will mean the realization of many years of work for Yacilla. %u201c Ideally the sculpture was designed to be part of another type of process%u2014the building of a founda1111 HD IR T W O R K : T e s t m odel of O scar Y a c illa %u2019 s dirt sculpture (Inset) m ay be recre ate d full s ize d on Baltic S treet lot.it was a creative use of the space while the Fifth Avenue Committee finds out another use for it.%u201dThe Fifth Avenue Committee has ideas about using part of the lot for residential purposes. While waiting for the Board of Education to disclose its own set of plans, the committee has decided to support the sculpture project. ,The project has also gained the support of Carmen Quinones, president of the P.S. 133 Parent Association. %u201c I think it%u2019s a very good idea compared to what is there now. The lot is full of tires and bricks, and kids get hurt. Lots of mothers won%u2019t let their kids goat the October 17 general meeting. Board members reacted favorably \have to iron out several legal problems before giving final permission.%u201cMy impression after having talked to Mr. Yacilla briefly, and looking at the plans, is that it would be a benefit to the community and school,%u201d said board member Martha Graham. %u201c If adequate steps are taken to ensure safety and provisions are made for Insurance and liahility, I think we ought to give it our backing so that the project can obtain funding.%u201c P.S. 133 has a problem. It%u2019stion. I wanted my project to take part within that process. I saw it as a chance for construction companies to contribute to the public. After all, they are closing up streets and causing general inconvenience.%u201dYacilla collected the names of the world%u2019s largest construction companies and sent out letters to 22 firms in Europe, South America, Africa and the United States.%u201c I was very naive,%u201d he says now. %u201c I thought that if I sent letters all over the place someone would answer. I had a very primitive idea about the kinds of resources necessary to carry out a project likeCarroll: Mega%u2019s Not A Full Time LegislatorBY PETER HALEYThe battle for the Bay RidgePark Slope 21st Senatorial District seat has broken wide open, principally over the question of whether legislative work should be a full-time job.In debates and on the campaign trail, Park Slope attorney John Carroll has begun to push the issue that his opponent, Republican Assemblyman Christopher Mega, kept his law practice while serving in the Assembly and will continue to do so if elected to the Senate. Although Assemblymen and Senators are allowed to hold outside jobs, those who do, said Carroll, are %u201c legislators who are not servicing their neighborhoods.%u201d Mega maintains that he is a %u201cfull-time%u201d legislator and that v-arroii s concern is a guise to increase government spending.%u201c A base salary of $23,500 for the state Senate is not a meager salary yet we have to contend with public officials such as Mega who have a lack of regard for the community,%u201dsaid Carroll, claiming that Mega opened a district office only last summer.Mega in recent debates has countered that the taxpayers are getting their money%u2019s worth from him as an Assemblyman since he has a %u201c full-time%u201d attendance record. Expanding the Assembly into a full-time job, %u201c reformer%u201d style, is just another case of %u201ctoo much government,%u201d according to Mega, and a hidden ploy to increase spending at the taxpayers%u2019 expense.%u201c What reformers are looking for is a full-time job which pays $45,000 for a 12-month session and then they will be asking for staff increases to accompany it,%u201d said Mega. %u201c As far as I%u2019m concerned the sooner we get the job done in a iegisiaiive session ana get out ot Albany, the better. We have too much federal government and now the reformers want to do the same to our state government.%u201dThe 21st S.D. has been a Republican post for 34 years andfor the past 25 years it has been held by departing William Conklin. Carroll%u2019s emphasis on performance is based on the understanding that the race will be won in Bay Ridge, where his liberal stance on abortion and the death penalty may alienate the conservative Democrats that make up most of the District%u2019s registered voters.%u201cCarroll doesn%u2019t like to be known as a liberal Democrat and prefers to call himself an independent Democrat but when he is on the liberal side of issues he doesn%u2019t think the way the majority of the people in this district do,%u201d said Mega, crediting his five years in Albany and increasing plurality in the last election to an accurate reflection of community sentiment.%u201cI support the death penalty and am opposed to funding 'ibortions and in turn the community has supported me,%u201d said Mega.As a Democrat, Carroll maintains that the Republicans have not represented Bay Ridge in terms of community service and chargesthat Mega is typical of the Republicans who have supported banking, insurance, real estate company interests to the detriment of the community.%u201c Bay Ridge has a redlining problem and is beginning to feel , threatened and it needs leaders who will fight that decline,%u201d said Carroll. %u201c We are going to take Mega to task right in his own 50th A.D. and point out that he voted against rent control and stabilization bills that protect tenants and has supported the banking, real estate, and insurance interests in Albany.%u201dMega ridiculed Carroll%u2019s charge that he supported pro-business legislation at the expense of the community and pointed out that Governor Carey%u2019s own redlining bill got the support of the Republican Senate but failed in the Democratic-dominated Assembly.The candidates are scheduled to debate at Union Church, 81st Street and Ridge Boulevard, 8 p.m. today.this. One company in India was interested for a while. They wrote a few letters, but I never heard from them again.%u201dExcavation of the sculpture will be done with bulldozers, but Yacilla says some finishing may have to be done by hand. %u201c I%u2019m going to have to work out some of the physical problems with a civil engineer. In order to comply with city laws we%u2019re going to have to find some kind of reinforcement for the structure, something that won%u2019t be seen. I%u2019ve been told that the soil is 60 percent clay on the surface, so depending on what is underneath, I don%u2019t expect erosion to be much of a problem in the two months it will be there.%u201dSTUDENT PARTICIPATIONYacilla does not rule out the possibility of P.S. 133 children getting involved in some way. Gothelf is planning on it.%u201cThe children will get involved in some way. We may make our own sand sculptures or have a contest. We won%u2019t let any opportunity for a creative outlet pass. We%u2019ll figure out something,%u201d he said./The shape, which Yacilla calls %u201c 7,%u201d the magical number of primitive cultures, evolved over a long period of time. %u201c I%u2019ve always been interested in circles. I did long scrolls with shapes, usually circles. I started moving the circles around to see what shape was most satisfying. Intuition works to a point, but then you have to use all available tools, all disciplines.1 think all artists become obsessed. I saw a shape in my dreams, but wasn%u2019t happy with it. After all, dreams are but a surfacing of our consciousness. I dreamed, took notes, and had new ideas. Eventually I turned to Euclidean geometry and typology (the study of symbols). Through it I got a better understanding of what I wanted.%u201d%u201c I studied American Indian construction, especially the tribes which built burial mounds. Eastern India and Islamic architecture also influenced me. Slowly the form took shape.%u201d%u201cI also spent a lot of time watching sports events on television. I measured how long it took the players to run from one end of the field to the other. I knew everyone would have their own approach to the sculpture and some would want to run. I won%u2019t say the choice of the basketball court was totally irrelevent to the project. My theme is motion, and basketball deals with walking, with human displacement.%u201dYacilla began recently to teach children who read below grade level in a program called, %u201c Learning to Read Through the Arts.%u201d %u201c Art is a magnificent medium to approach other disciplines. Through art I was motivated to find out about architecture, city planning, and several other fields. With the help of crafts, painting, and other activities, we try to encourage the kids to read.%u201dHis expanded definition of art is perhaps the most important aspect of Yacilla%u2019s work. %u201c Art usually happens in this manner,%u201d he says. %u201c You start with an intuition. You analyze it, carefully dissect and examine it. Art doesn%u2019t shy away from other disciplines, math, law, physics. This is what art means to me. It%u2019s an intuition later developed.%u201d%u201cAn artist represents his or her times. Art is a reaction to it. I feelhnnafill TLlnoc, . -------%u00a9%u201c - v t.%u00bb u g u *5 *'/4the better. Not only because I live here in Park Slope, a very dynamic community, but things are becoming more peaceful. I%u2019m becoming aware of mankind as a totality... That%u2019s what moves me%u2014I feel a change.%u201dPage 4 , T H E P H O E N IX , O ctobe r 2 6 ,1 9 7 8