Home » Kentucky’s literary heritage to be celebrated in Lexington’s newest public art project

Kentucky’s literary heritage to be celebrated in Lexington’s newest public art project

Screen Shot 2017-10-19 at 10.21.36 AMLEXINGTON, Ky. (Oct. 19, 2017) — LexArts today announced a new and unique public art project, Book Benches, born from an unprecedented collaboration of creativity between Arts Connect, LexArts and The Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning.

Building on the enormous success and community support for previous projects such as Horsemania and The Bourbon Barrel Project, 35 book-shaped fiberglass benches, each illustrated by a Kentucky artist and themed around different works by Kentucky authors, will be placed throughout Lexington during the summer and fall of 2018. This project seeks to celebrate Kentucky’s rich, diverse literary heritage, encourage reading, and generate more interest in and support for public art. 

Artists will be invited to submit designs based on their illustrative interpretation of a work written by a Kentucky author. A Call for Artists will be issued in mid-November.

Just as with previous similar projects, sponsorships will be available to businesses, private citizens or groups of individuals such as book clubs, neighborhood associations, etc. Five benches are being made available to local schools as student art projects.  Partial proceeds from the public auction of these five benches will be provided to the Library and Art Departments of these respective schools.

Throughout the project, special programs and events will be hosted for artists and sponsors, as well as for the public. 

The public display period will be from June – October 2018, concluding with a gala and live auction at The Livery. All proceeds from this event will go to further the missions of Arts Connect, LexArts and the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning.

Major underwriting support has been provided by the Downtown Lexington Management District, VisitLEX, and LFUCG – Corridors Commission. Additional underwriting and in-kind sponsorship opportunities are available.

For more information, interested parties may visit the website BookBenchesLex.org, or contact Project Administrator, Kate Savage, at [email protected].