Meet me at the rainbow cave

Summer is back. And as ripples of dandelions spread over glowing grass hillsides, it's clear why UAA's colors are green and gold. So make the most of the sunshine and get outside. With University Lake Dog Park on one end and Cuddy Quad on the other, campus is a full of options.

May we suggest the sculpture garden on the Alaska Quad?

The Alaska what-now?

Unless you work with facilities or landscaping, you've likely never heard of this corner of campus. The Alaska Quad is a small hillside blanketed in trees on the eastern edge of campus, designated as wilderness space after the ConocoPhillips Integrated Science Building was built to the west. Just shy of two acres (or, only 0.5 percent of campus), the patch of forest, surrounded by pavement, feels very woodsy and tranquil despite being a stone's throw south of a parking garage. Easy-to-miss pathways crisscross the quad to connect nearby buildings including, importantly, the Fine Arts Building.

In recent years, art students have treated their wooded backyard as an outdoor gallery. Take a stroll and discover sculptures hiding around every corner. Even the tree trunks are painted in fading Chinese poems. And like those painted poems, most of the art on the quad is weathering away, adding an element of decay.

"Time-based artwork can be very powerful... I think the mystery back there makes the spot really quite fun," noted art professor Tom Chung. "It's almost a sculpture park now, with surprises around every corner and some work so degraded one can only guess as to the original form."

New art pieces occasionally restock the area, thanks in part to a 3D Design course Tom teaches during the summer. His course familiarizes students with the sculpture potential of various materials, and culminates with a site-specific installation. For their assignment, students reflect and respond to a chosen environment, then add a piece that makes viewers take note of the space in a unique and unexpected way.

Art all over

As a professor, Tom was happy to see many of his students opt outdoors. "We live in such a technology-based society and I think the opportunity for my students to spend a lot of time very carefully observing nature-albeit the nature behind the art building-was a nice break from what they typically do in their lives," he noted.

Students last summer turned to various corners of campus for their installations. One student stayed indoors, building a fine dining experience adjacent to the art department's vending machines, with candles and tablecloth, Cheez-Its and M&Ms. Another student placed an uplifting piece near Providence Hospital, building a sculpture of branches with hopeful words printed on artificial leaves.

One of the most striking, substantial and visible pieces was (and is) a giant rainbow string cave called Neon Network. The eye-catching creation comes from art major Alyeska Brunke and is still on display on the Alaska Quad, just beyond the back doors of the Fine Arts Building.

The location is intentional; Alyeska observed students passing by the quad, then placed her large, colorful piece in sight of the building's busy back sidewalk to provide a "what the?!?" moment for people passing by.

It's a cave! It's a spiderweb! It's site-specific art!

Alyeska knew she wanted to weave a geometrical web in the trees, but had to rely on the setting to dictate the finished project. The environment informed her project-specifically, biological geometry in the natural world-but she directly contrasted that environment with rad colors that belong in a neon factory.

"The sculpture speaks to naturally occurring forms, yet reveals a contrast between the natural and artificial/manmade," she noted. "I made it large so people would actually immerse themselves into the art and view it from many angles. The underlying intent is for viewers to experience a sort of synergy between the natural world and what humans have created from it."

It was no small task. Her project involved cutting hundreds of lengths of candy-colored ropes and anchoring them to trunks, branches and other strings.

The project required three 10-hour days digging in the dirt and climbing in the trees, and she reckons it would have taken two more days if she hadn't enlisted her boyfriend's help.

Now nearly a year old, the cave remains intact and the colors still pop against the browns and greens of the forest. It's dominant yet inviting, demanding to be explored and appreciated from dozens of angles.

"I hope it will make people stop and want to investigate not just my sculpture, but all of the other sculptures waiting to be discovered," she said

Secret garden

The garden continues to grow-a pink hen arrived in recent weeks-and Tom's 3D Design section this summer will likely add even more to the Alaska Quad.

A handful of the sculptures predate Tom's class assignment (look out for what he calls "a giant durian-like spiked fruit sculpture that seems to get moved around every year"). So, like him, keep your eyes trained for new additions. "Some of it is funny, some poignant, and it always reminds me of my students," he said.

"I like the idea of people unfamiliar with [the space] being surprised and hope it can do that for a long time."

Written by J. Besl, UAA Office of University Advancement