A & E

They are the installation of those large-scale art projects that have filled Point State Park, and sometimes places beyond, like last year's "River Eyelash" by Pennsylvania artist Stacy Levy. It reached out in long strands of multi-colored Styrofoam fishing buoys into the rivers from the fountain.

This year, the "public art" for the festival is a little different. That's because this year's most ambitious projects are not near the Point, but scattered around Downtown.

"This year, the artists decided to take advantage of the larger footprint of the Downtown area," says arts festival curator Katherine Talcott.

A tree for the gods

If you have been anywhere near the Golden Triangle in recent days, chances are you've seen it -- a 35-foot Willow Oak tree lying horizontally, about 12 feet above the earth, in the Stanwix Triangle at the intersection of Liberty Avenue and Stanwix Street.

If it looks like an offering to the gods, Mother Nature or some other higher being, that's because, in a way, it is. At least that's what the artist says.

"It's almost like an offering (that speaks to) the convergence of the three rivers nearby," says Reinhard Reitzenstein, a Canadian artist from the Niagara Falls area who is currently Head of the Sculpture Program, SUNY Buffalo, and is widely known for his ecological art.

"This will be the third time I will have done this type of work -- this place I found was really a perfect site to revisit that idea."

Titled "Denied Veriditas," this piece takes its place as the third work of a series that started with a similar work, "Displacement Viriditas," in Peterborough, Ontario, and "Compromiso Viriditas" in Caracas, Venezuela, both created in the early 1990s.

Viriditas comes from the word viridian, a hue of green that speaks to the green of new life in the spring.

The titling of the projects refers to the constant decimation of forests and green spaces globally, always justified through urban and technological imperatives.

"The Viriditas projects have met with many disgruntled, annoyed, and even at times angry viewers' responses but never with indifference," Reitzenstein says.

"The significance of the tree as a central icon in my work speaks to the symbiosis that we share with the forests of the world. The forests through the phenomenon of photosynthesis provide us with the oxygen to breathe. Through our collective arrogance world wide, expressed through the devastation of the forests, we are taking our own breath away."

Catapulted from Hays Woods

Reitzenstein uses trees yet again in "Displacement/Inversion." This one is located farther up Liberty Avenue in an alleyway around the corner of the Three Rivers Arts Festival's offices and galleries.

Comprising eight poplar saplings, 12 to 15 feet tall, that were donated by Eisler Landscapes of Prospect, the piece features all eight trees suspended upside down from a steel cable matrix so that the tips are about 18 feet in the air.

Reitzenstein says, "I see them as kind of being catapulted out of Hays Woods."

Reitzenstein has become familiar with the controversy over Hays Woods, Pittsburgh's 635-acre forest situated within three miles of the Downtown area on a hilltop overlooking the Monongahela River in the Hays neighborhood of the city, which was being considered for the development of a casino and horse-racing track. Plans for that have since been scrapped by the owner of the property. But Reitzenstein says his piece still is relevant.

"It's a comment on the death of urban trees and urban green spaces. But it particularly relates to the problems with what could happen to Hays Woods in the near future."

Putt-Putt for Pittsburgh

A third public art project also focuses on placing more green space in our urban space. But in this case, it's putting greens.

Under the direction of Talcott and Ross Chapman, from the Pittsburgh Children's Museum Exhibit Design Team, seven Pittsburgh artists have crafted different "holes" for a seven-hole miniature-golf course.

Visitors can play six of the holes, which will be at Point State Park, before journeying through Downtown on the way to the seventh hole, at 937 Liberty Ave.

One of the artists, Bob Ziller, has been busy crafting the framework for "The Crazy American Car Quilt Teepee," his version of the putt-putt golf course classic, the Indian teepee.

Fourteen feet tall and 48 feet in circumference at the base, he is building the teepee out of two dozen car hoods, which he likens to "hides" of automobiles.

"You putt your way into the teepee," he says. "The ramp leading up to it is like a highway."

"This was a sculptural idea I had years ago. So, it just happened to be perfect for this project," Ziller says of his zany sculpture, which is painted gold on the inside and includes a "Penguin Crossing" sign next to the roadway ramp.

The course, called "Lions, and Tigers, and Groundhogs ... Oh My!" will be open from noon-8 p.m. daily throughout the run of the festival.

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