Public Farm 1
After reading about this project and viewing the photos online, I wanted to share my observation of Public Farm 1, in New York, which has some lofty goals:
NEW YORK, February 7, 2008: The Museum of Modern Art and P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center are proud to announce the winner of the ninth annual MoMA/P.S.1 Young Architects Program: WORK Architecture Company from New York. The purpose of the program is to provide emerging young talent in architecture with the chance to prepare and present architectural solutions for a specific site. This year, five finalists selected by a closed nomination process were asked to present an urban landscape for the large entrance courtyard of P.S.1, with the allotted project budget of $70,000. Essential to the design were elements of shade, water, seating, and bar areas.
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P.F.1 (Public Farm One) is an urban farm concept that evokes the look of a flying carpet landing in the P.S.1 courtyard. Constructed from large cardboard tubes, its top surface will be a working farm, blooming with a variety of vegetables and plants. The structure will create a textured, colorful, and constantly changing surface in contrast with P.S.1’s angular concrete and gravel courtyard. P.F.1 will work as an interactive bridge between outside and inside, creating multiple zones of activity including swings, fans, sound effects, innovative seating areas, and a refreshing pool at its center.
Go watch the time-lapse video of the construction: Public Farm 1 and then come back here for my two cents. At least watch the first half, for the construction of the infrastructure.
Done?
OK, they had a budget of $70,000 and a mission of:
“Bringing sustainable construction together with sustainable agriculture”
and then they built it out of polyurethane-coated cardboard (Sono) tubes, plywood, 2 by 4′s, special “GaiaSoil” made with pectin-coated polystyrene, rubber liners, tons of bolts and intricate construction techniques?
If you watched the video, you’ll see them build a ramp with stick (2 by 4/6/12′s) and plywood construction. It’s like a house or a bridge, with concrete footers and columns.
Are you kidding me?
How is that sustainable construction or agriculture?
According to the treehugger website, the architect, Dan Wood says that the produce and eggs will be used in the restaurant at PS1. Earlier in the article, it states that the chickens lay a half dozen eggs a day. That’s six, for those with bad math skills. How many people could they really feed with that setup? And the name Public Farm implies that I could go there and harvest food as well. Maybe they should call it “Farm-like Art”?
I haven’t found any statistics on square foot of growing area, or a materials list, but this project seems mostly art, or architecture, not farm or garden. I know some people who could turn $70,000 into a farm that would put this to shame (but it wouldn’t have speakers and a cellphone charging station and a bar and a waterfall).
Here’s a juicy quote:
“Receiving this extraordinarily seductive visual version of a farm at P.S.1 struck deep into my rural roots. I own a farm in South Dakota, and my neighbors are very excited about coming to New York City this summer to see the urban competition!” states P.S.1 Director Alanna Heiss.
I won’t bash it anymore, but I don’t like it when things are billed as sustainable or green just for the publicity. Maybe I’m way off base here, but it doesn’t seem to be so green to me…
The final photos are here: PublicFarm1.org
Let me know what you think.
Image: t_a_i_s at Flickr under a Creative Commons License
As far as art goes, it’s pretty cool, but really, it just seems like an expensive square-foot garden.