Vail’s artistic soul is on full display through the summer with globally recognized art on display throughout town and at dozens of public art galleries. Art enthusiasts and wide-eyed wanderers are rewarded with an enriching art experience.
Art in Public Places
Art in Public Places of Vail has assembled a collection of art in public places including over 60 works of art with 35 created by Colorado artists. The Town’s art collection ranges from paintings, sculptures, murals, and playground components to site-integrated art.
Wednesday Art Walks
Enjoy a free one-hour public art tour of Vail each Wednesday of the month starting July 6 through Aug. 31. This summer’s tour features four new sculptures, a gift of Vicki and Kent Logan to the Town of Vail’s public art collection. The tour winds its way through the Village with discussions of the history of the Vail Valley, the founding of Vail Mountain, the master planning of the Village, and the importance of site-specific art. The town’s public art collection includes over 55 works ranging from paintings, sculptures, murals, playground components, to site-integrated art. Over 30 works of art in the Town of Vail’s collection are created by Colorado artists.
VIEW ART MAP
Murals Created for Vail
Art in Public Places (AIPP) is pleased to announce the completion of new murals by artists Olive Moya and the collective duo Pedro Barrios and Jaime Molina. Since 2019, Colorado artists have been invited by AIPP to enliven and enhance Vail’s public spaces. Olive Moya combines a wheat pasting application with her signature vibrant palette in the large interior mural now on view at the Vail Village Transportation Center. The installation combines glimpses of Vail’s past complemented with her contemporary style as it moves down the stairs and out to the main entrance of Vail Village.
In June Pedro Barrios and Jaime Molina returned to Vail to transform five large cylindrical vents west of Dobson Ice Arena. In their 2019 Lionshead mural, Valley Threnody, two faces are surrounded by a vibrant palette of abstraction, connecting them by the layers of this colorful quilt. The figures, whose identity is left open for interpretation, may represent family members, friends, ancestors, or even strangers. Regardless of their relationship, the artists convey we are all connected by the commonality of humankind in their mural. Inspired by the positive reactions while creating this mural, the artists presented a similar concept for the five vents creating a sense of family.
Art Galleries
Vail is home to dozens of unique galleries throughout the Villages of Vail and Lionshead. Whether you have a full day or just an afternoon, there’s so much to take in as you wander through and support these incredibly talented artists.
The Summervail Art Workshop Legacy Project (SAWLP) and Vail Symposium
Join an international panel of participants to discuss the Valley Curtain project’s conception, development, construction, and continuing legacy, Thursday, July 28, 2022 from 6:00-7:30pm at the Vail Mountain School
Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s projects, which are funded entirely by the artists, often taking decades to realize, involve the painstaking cooperation of hundreds of people and interested parties including government officials, judges, environmental groups, landowners, local residents, engineers, construction workers, paid workers, and members of the general public. In the eyes of the artists, the journey through the multi-layered process of approvals is as much a part of the artwork as the final installation itself.
Valley Curtain (1970-72) located in Rifle, CO was one such work and arguably one of the under-recognized installations in the couples’ oeuvre. Fashioned from 4 1/2 acres of orange nylon fabric and suspended between two mountain slopes above Colorado’s I-70 highway, Valley Curtain was conceived as a dramatic environmental intervention in the Grand Hogback Mountain Range. The project took 28 months to come to fruition, yet Valley Curtain’s duration would only last 28 hours, cut dramatically short by gale force winds, estimated in excess of 60 mph, that necessitated the start of its removal.
Only a relatively small number of people would ultimately bear witness to Valley Curtain’s material existence between August 10 and 11 in 1972, among them Christo and Jeanne-Claude, their team of engineers and construction workers, fans, neighbors, a handful of press, highway drivers passing through, and local golfers. Among these workers were 12 members of the 1972 Summervail Workshop for Art and Critical Thinking, some of whom would continue working with Christo and Jeanne-Claude for the remainder of their careers.
The program’s panel will include:
- Jonathan Henery, a nephew involved in the daily workings of Christo and Jeanne-Claude who now manages the couples’ studio and home in New York City and runs The Christo and Jeanne-Claude Foundation;
- Vladimir Yavachev, a nephew who worked alongside Christo from the age of 15 and helped bring his uncle’s work to life. After Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s passings, he constructed Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s unfinished work L’Arc De Triomphe and is currently working on The Mastaba project in UAE;
- Wolfgang Volz, assistant photographer of the Valley Curtain Starting in 1971, Volz became the lead photographer for Christo and Jeanne-Claude and has since become one of the world’s premier landscape photographers;
- James Baker, Artist, writer, former director of Anderson Ranch Arts Center in Snowmass Village, CO and Moderator of the Symposium Event;
- David Yust, a retired CSU professor and world-renowned artist who was a friend and colleague of Christo and Jeanne-Claude; and
- Dan Telleen, a Vail resident and local businessman who, as a student at SummerVail in 1972, traveled to Rifle and helped with the Valley Curtain