{"id":42529,"date":"2025-07-28T11:53:23","date_gmt":"2025-07-28T11:53:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/42529\/"},"modified":"2025-07-28T11:53:23","modified_gmt":"2025-07-28T11:53:23","slug":"how-slc-used-1m-on-public-art-to-talk-about-the-great-salt-lake","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/42529\/","title":{"rendered":"How SLC used $1M on public art to talk about the Great Salt Lake"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nearly two years ago, the Salt Lake City Arts Council<\/a> was awarded its \u201csingle largest grant ever<\/a>\u201d to raise awareness about the state of the declining Great Salt Lake through public art.<\/p>\n

So, how has the money been used?<\/p>\n

Andrew Shaw, lead of the ensuing Wake the Great Salt Lake<\/a> art series, said the word \u201cwake\u201d has several definitions in this context: \u201ca wake is what happens when you move through water, your wake is a celebration of life, but of something that\u2019s dying \u2026 and then also just awakening consciousness.\u201d <\/p>\n

Shaw said 125 artists responded to the project\u2019s call for proposals and ultimately 12<\/a> were chosen to fit the $1 million budget allotted to them by Bloomberg Philanthropies, the organization that awarded the city the money. Each of those projects, or activations, reside in Utah\u2019s seven City Council districts. <\/p>\n

And each of the 12 artists are either from Utah or have ties to the Beehive State, Shaw said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we were really looking for was maximum diversity,\u201d he said. \u201cWe wanted to have as many artistic genres and mediums in the project.\u201d<\/p>\n

From a podcast to a dance performance \u2014 these creators came together to deliver art that encourages Utahns to consider the lake in different ways. <\/p>\n

The Salt Lake Tribune looked at five of the 12 total activations: <\/p>\n

Great Salt Lake Hopeline <\/p>\n

For childhood friends Han Calder, Nick Carpenter and Ben Doxey, hearing the authentic sounds of the lake at the Great Salt Lake Shorelands Preserve became the inspiration behind their bright pink phone booth: what they call a \u201chopeline.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just so phenomenal and loud,\u201d Calder said of the preserve.<\/p>\n

The Great Salt Lake Hopeline<\/a> is a dial-in phone booth where visitors can share their stories or hopes and fears for the lake. The trio of friends, Calder said, wanted to focus on hope rather than the \u201cdoom and gloom\u201d of the state of the lake, and make the activation as interactive as possible. <\/p>\n

(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Headphones sit on a table as part of a public art event hosted by Wake the Great Salt Lake and the Great Salt Lake Hopeline at Fisher Brewing Co. in Salt Lake City on Monday, March 24, 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis hopeline [is] a connection between the lake and the community,\u201d Calder said.<\/p>\n

So far, the hopeline has received stories and memories of the lake and Antelope Island. People can also call 979-GSL-HOPE (979-475-4673) to listen to stories from other people and sounds of the lake and the birds that flock to it. Some of those stories are also turned into podcast episodes<\/a>, available at gslhopeline.org\/podcast. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve tried to make \u2026 the lake an active participant,\u201d Calder said, \u201cWe have slogans like, \u2018She is listening,\u2019 and we do try to kind of personify the lake and make her a part of the community.\u201d <\/p>\n

The booth has previously made appearances at Fisher Brewing Co., the Utah Museum of Contemporary Arts and Kilby Block Party. You can find out where it will be next through Instagram<\/a> under the account @gslhopeline. <\/p>\n

(Bethany Baker | The Salt Lake Tribune) Gabriel Moreno listens to voicemail messages other people have left for the Great Salt Lake during a pop-up event hosted at Fisher Brewing Co. in Salt Lake City on Monday, March 24, 2025.<\/p>\n

Outdoor site-responsive dance <\/p>\n

Other artists, like Mitsu Salmon, took a more interpretive approach with their activations. <\/p>\n

Salmon used to live near the Miller Bird Refuge and Nature Park, walking its path daily. It\u2019s a space where she would see all kinds of birds that stopped while migrating. What she observed on that daily walk is what served as the inspiration for her outdoor, site-responsive dance. <\/a> <\/p>\n

\u201cI was also very interested in the birds of the Great Salt Lake. I\u2019d think, \u2018I would love to do a piece here in this Miller bird park sanctuary, and have it connect to the Great Salt Lake and the birds and ideas of migration,\u201d Salmon said. \u201cIt started through just walking on this path and imagining dancers popping out of trees and on bridges.\u201d <\/p>\n

(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Mitsu Salmon directs a rehearsal for a dance performance in Salt Lake City on Tuesday, April 22, 2025.<\/p>\n

A site-responsive work is connected to the environment it is set in. In Salmon\u2019s piece, the music for her dancers was nature\u2019s soundtrack: songbirds. Some parts of the performance required headphones for audience members to listen to recorded music. <\/p>\n

The performance was meant to showcase the crucial role the lake plays for migratory birds, while also drawing attention to how humans migrate. To respect the environment and bird\u2019s habitat, only nine audience members at a time were allowed to see the 40-minute performance, which happened a few times a day over a handful of days. <\/p>\n

Audience members followed the dancers along on the hiking path and were immersed in the environment. <\/p>\n

\u201c[I\u2019ve] found it exciting and inspiring,\u201d Salmon said, \u201cto look at bird movement and work with the dancers to develop our own interpretation of that.\u201d <\/p>\n

(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Roxanne Gray, Ai Fujii Nelson, Mitsu Salmon and Masio Sangster rehearse for a dance performance in Salt Lake City on Tuesday, April 22, 2025.<\/p>\n

Billboards <\/p>\n

Some activations explore what the future may hold, like Nick Pedersen\u2019s Poplar Grove billboards. Pedersen is a photographer and digital artist who combines his photos to \u201cmake a statement, mainly about environmental issues.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really interested,\u201d Pederson said, \u201cin thinking about the future and human impact on nature.\u201d <\/p>\n

Pedersen is from Utah but lived on the East Coast for 10 years. When he came back home, he went out to Antelope Island and was shocked by how much the lake had shrunk. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt made me really want to create a project about that,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

(Palak Jayswal|The Salt Lake Tribune) Billboards at the corner of 900 South and 900 West in Poplar Grove. The billboards were created by Nick Pedersen as part of the “Wake the Great Salt Lake” intiative.<\/p>\n

His two billboards<\/a> capture two different futures for the lake. In one, the \u201cbright future\u201d \u2014 where water in the lake is replenished, Pedersen shows a thriving ecosystem. On the other side is a more \u201capocalyptic\u201d approach, he said, showing the negative consequences scientists have warned about \u2014 things like toxic dust.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThese two billboards could kind of be in conversation with each other and show two different opposing viewpoints,\u201d he said. The billboards are located near the International Peace Gardens on the banks of the Jordan River, a tributary to the Great Salt Lake. <\/p>\n

Pedersen spent six months working on the billboard collages, pulling different images from his database to create the multilayered works. Each image is made of dozens of separate layers of photographs he pieced together.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s this sort of intervention into people\u2019s daily routines,\u201d Pedersen said of the billboard format. \u201cGetting them to think about this huge issue, when a lot of times, people don\u2019t know enough about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pedersen\u2019s works are still up at the corner of 900 South and 900 West in and will be until someone else rents the Reagan billboards. <\/p>\n

By a Thread <\/p>\n

Artist Kellie Bornhoft created an interactive sculpture piece called \u201cBy a Thread\u201d<\/a> that directly connected viewers to the plants and animals that rely on the lake for survival.<\/p>\n

Bornhoft started by talking to local experts, like scientists from the Department of Natural Resources and Bonnie Baxter at The Great Salt Lake Institute, to get a better visual understanding of what some of these species might look like. <\/p>\n

\u201cAll the species included on that list are dependent on the Great Salt Lake, some are endemic to the Great Salt Lake,\u201d Bornhoft said. Of the 64 species that she digitally illustrated, some of them had never been visualized before, like a new species of algae that Baxter discovered in the lake. <\/p>\n

(Salt Lake City Arts Council) Kellie Bornhoft’s “By a Thread” artwork on display at the Utah Capitol. The artwork is a part of the “Wake the Great Salt Lake” art initiative.<\/p>\n

After she finished illustrating, Bornhoft submitted the images to Creative Commons, a license system that allows creators to share their work with others. <\/p>\n

The illustrations were then printed on 40-inch by 40-inch panels of transparent fabric that Bornhoft sewed into banners. Those banners were added to a tree-like structure that rotates 360 degrees, letting viewers come up and touch them and learn about the species. The piece is no longer on display.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe most impactful thing that we can do as artists is partner with truth, which is the scientific facts that predict the kind of outcome, but then find a way to tell that story in a way that is kind of tangible,\u201d Bornhoft said. \u201cBy just representing those species, they\u2019re able to stand up for themselves and have an image and have a presence.\u201d <\/p>\n

Of Salt and Sand <\/p>\n

Ashley Finley and Jeri Gravlin are part of the team called Of Salt and Sand that produces a multimedia project meant to elevate the stories of people who are directly impacted by the lake.<\/p>\n

The stories are put in a podcast called \u201cStay Salty<\/a>,\u201d while Gravlin photographed subjects with objects from their stories that tied back to the lake. The podcast, available at lakefacing.org\/podcast, features stories from members of the Shoshone and Ute tribes, lake advocates like Nan Seymour, and an incarcerated person at the nearby Utah State Correctional facility. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe main goal,\u201d Gravlin said,\u201cis to lift up voices that maybe aren\u2019t always heard.\u201d <\/p>\n

Raising awareness of these stories, the team hopes, can help bridge feelings of being removed from the lake. Finley said leaning into \u201cthe transformative power of narrative storytelling\u201d is key to the project. <\/p>\n

(Jeri Gravlin) Rios Pacheco, left, cultural and history adviser for the Northwestern Band of the Shoshone Nation, talks to Olivia Juarez, co-host of the podcast “Stay Salty: Lakefacing Stories,” at the Antelope Island State Park Visitor Center on March 11, 2024, discussing Shoshone connections to the Great Salt Lake.<\/p>\n