A Forgotten Past
Tokens of Appreciation
Kaleigh’s blog entries.
While wandering the Mission Hill area, I have discovered many sites that a person may not find on a map. Interesting nooks and crannies of the Hill, these sites are unique for their architecture, for their view, for their nature or their materiality. Whatever their particular traits may be, these sites juxtaposed to the rest of the community make them special. Perhaps you are a resident of Mission Hill; perhaps not. Perhaps you have been to these locations before; perhaps you will find a new treasure.
My mission is to help those who are interested discover these spots, and for the time you take to appreciate Mission Hill, I will give you a token of my appreciation. At each location listed on the map will be ten “Tokens” of my appreciation for you to find. They are small, wooden, coin-like pieces, printed with original works of art depicting the site they will be discovered at. And they are for you to keep, if you choose.
What will you get from this experience? I can’t say. Perhaps you will frequent these sites often as a place of contemplation, a simple way to escape the chaos of the city; perhaps you will never visit these spots again. Either way, I hope you enjoy your wanderings.
(My name is Kaleigh O’Keefe Heinhold, and I am a Sculpture/Art History major at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. This is my first public art project, created with the help of Kevin Banker. Please feel free to post responses to the project, or ask me any questions you may have. Thank you all for participating.)
To M&B of Massart Metals….
Thank you so much! You have no idea how exciting it is for me that these tokens meant something to you, and I am very excited to see what you put up at the end of the semester. I hope you stumble across some of the other tokens on your next walk, or take a map and hunt them down. Either way, I’m glad they are special to you. (sorry it took so long to respond, I’m still figuring out this blog thing)
We went for a walk Sunday night at 11:30. We found the tokens on the Parker Hill benches overlooking Boston around 1 AM, probably shortly after they were distributed.
Those benches are an important place for us, and it was important to find the tokens there. There will be a response piece up there after the semester ends. We’ll let you know.
M&B, MassArt Metals
Side one of the map, designed by Kevin Banker. This morning I dropped some maps off at the Boston Public Library by the Copley T stop, the Parker Hill Library Branch, and Mike’s Donuts on Tremont St. And that’s all of them! I think I’m going to print some more out this afternoon and see if Yes Oui Si will take some of them.
Side two of the map, designed by Kevin Banker. Hopefully it’s legible, I had to decrease the quality in order to get it on the internet.
I used a block of soft linoleum to carve out what basically act as stamps, ink the linoleum, and printed them to small wooden disks. I put my initials, the print number, and this web address onto the back in pen, and sprayed both sides with an acrylic coating to make sure the elements wouldn’t ruin the ink while the tokens are outside.
The tokens were distributed last night, and the maps are going out today. You’ll be able to find them in the Boston Public Library near the Copley T stop, in the Parker Hill Branch Library on Tremont Street, or in other public places around the area (depending on who will let me leave them in their establishment today).
-kaleigh
Make Yourself at Home
What? Free “Family Photos” by the mantelpiece for all willing members of the Mission Hill (And Boston) community. As people come out from Easter mass at the basilica, I will offer them the chance to pose with other members of their neighborhood in front of a hand painted 8’x6’ backdrop of a fireplace and mantle as a faux-family. Each picture will include between 3-6 neighbors ranging in age and ethnicity. Mission Statement: With this event I wish to engage members of the Mission Hill community in an activity in which they voluntarily pose and associate themselves with their neighbors, instating a message of family orientation and values within the community.
-lila