Join RCHS, artists, and community members for an update and input meeting at the East Side Freedom Library to discuss the art project for the Ramsey County Courthouse/Saint Paul City Hall Council Chambers.

We are in the midst of a period in which historical monuments, markers, and murals have become focal points of community discussions across the country. These conversations have come to the fore in Saint Paul, and the City and County governments requested that RCHS lead an effort to add new artwork to the Council Chambers of the Saint Paul City Hall – Ramsey County Courthouse. The goals for this project include commissioning new, original artwork that interprets the same overarching themes in the 83-year-old murals currently on display in the Council Chambers—celebrating the people and progress of Saint Paul and Ramsey County.

Four new pieces of art are being commissioned, with two new pieces displayed concurrently with original murals in the Council Chambers for a period of several months. The city and county will determine a rotation schedule that will ensure that each of the original murals and new pieces is exhibited over the course of a year. Interpretive panels will be added that provide additional context about the existing murals as well as each of the new pieces. Through an open application process, twenty artists submitted proposals, and a citizens’ task force organized by RCHS selected four artists for these projects. We invite you to meet them, learn about their work, and express your own perspectives about what you would like to see on the walls. Please come and share your ideas.

Over the next five months RCHS and the Task Force will develop interpretive panels and create online materials that provide more information on the existing and new art. Additional materials will be provided that articulate the wide variety of perspectives on the existing artwork and generally how discriminatory, controversial, or otherwise problematic public art from the past is addressed today. As this discussion continues to unfold here and around the country, there is value in recognizing and presenting these varied perspectives.

For bios of the selected artists, and more information on the project, see https://www.rchs.com/news/courthouse_chamber_artists/

Free and open to all.