A special Crosscut admission of error and expression of humility

Remember that news report we ran about the guerilla-art installation at the Sculpture Park? No? Good. Never mind.
Crosscut archive image.

A new work is briefly installed at the Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle. (Greg Lundgren)

Remember that news report we ran about the guerilla-art installation at the Sculpture Park? No? Good. Never mind.

It doesn't quite call for an investigation by the Washington News Council, but like the Spokane Spokesman-Review, Crosscut, too, owes itself a flogging and would like to share its humiliation with readers. On April 30, 2007, at approximately 4 p.m., Crosscut posted an apparent eyewitness news report that should have set off alarm bells, raised red flags, raised eyebrows, strained credulity, and elicited snorts from the editor's desk – but didn't. Forehead-smacking occurred much later, when Seattle Post-Intelligencer art critic and legendary journalist Regina Hackett blogged about the event with proper context. Our article, "A one-hour artwork in the new Olympic Sculpture Park" by Greg Lundgren, was, as far as we can tell, factually accurate, but the author's apparent detachment was not genuine. People dressed in white really did build a swing set in the Olympic Sculpture Park to mock the Seattle Art Museum's hands-off policy regarding the more-permanent collection, but Lundgren did not happen upon the event. He helped plan it. Arts scenesters knew this, of course. The rest of us rubes did not. Lundgren is the L in JDL, the conceptual art team credited with placement of the replicant eaglets near Alexander Calder's "Eagle" sculpture and with orchestrating the swing-set installation. Lundgren tells us he didn't mean to deceive us and is sorry for the confusion. That's fine. He's an artist whose job it is to blur the lines of whatever. Our job is to sharpen the lines, and in this we failed. We'll do better at spotting mischief next time, and Lundgren says there will be a next time: "PDL has a very active year ahead and we would love to keep your readers abreast of performances and installations, both advertised and discreet." Note to self.

   

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