Everglades Trespass 2000

Integrated Art - Installation w/multiple components

12ft X 33ft X 58ft

2000

Description:
Artist Carl Cheng created this artwork to be integrated into the lobby of the Southwest Regional Library. Cheng created his design based on the theme of South Florida environment, particularly focusing on the Everglades. Artistic elements include a terrazzo floor (33 x 58 feet) reflecting the natural landscape - its water, grasses, alligators and a dividing roadway, while two skylight designs (24 x 20 feet and 28 x 8 feet) hovering above the terrazzo carpet, reflecting the brilliant blues and whites of moving clouds and the watery landscape.

Artist Statement:
"In my initial research time spent in the Everglades, my mind constantly drifted to the presence of prehistoric reptiles and the impact on the landscape of South Florida. Driving along one of the freeways the drainage canals alongside the highway revealed a number of resting alligators and walking out into Everglades National Park I felt a kind of mental relief that something in Nature once again reminds us we don't own the earth. In our time, we, the human beings who live on this earth, are aware that we are the virus that will engulf the planet.

The carpet in the lobby and the presence of ceiling skylight imagery allows us to walk across the predicament of our time. Every time we make use of resources of the library we will cross the threshold of being aware of our connection with Nature.

One of the interesting aspects of Public Art is the limitations of every project situation. For each project, I try to intensify my focus on these limitations to develop an inspiration for the concept of a project. As most artists know, creative "problem solving" is a continuing process whether one is deciding what color red to use or how to stretch canvas. The Pembroke Pines Library project is on such a fast schedule that for me it is a continuous non-stop performance of creative problem solving. The idea for developing the lobby with a terrazzo carpet and a lighted skylight for the artwork resulted from a natural process of limitations and possibilities."