Three artists featured on the Fremont canvas

By Kristen Peterson (contact)

Friday, June 1, 2007 | 6:53 a.m.

What: "Sky Is the Limit," by Haluk Akakce; "For Las Vegas," by Jenny Holzer; and "Aria," by Jennifer Steinkamp

When: 8:30 tonight

Where: The Fremont Street Canvas

Info: www.americansforthearts.com

People are sometimes shocked to learn that Las Vegas delved into high art in 1986 and that a small, contemporary art collective brought prominent New York artist Jenny Holzer to town to create a temporary public art project on the Strip.

A sign at Caesars Palace seemed an ideal medium for the artist who places profound text statements in public spaces. So members of the now-defunct Nevada Institute of Contemporary Arts made the call.

"We invited her to come to town and do a piece for the reader board at Caesars Palace," says Patrick Gaffey, longtime arts advocate and former board member of the institute. "Normally nothing goes on the Caesars Palace board that isn't about Caesars Palace, but we had some influential people on our board, namely Roger Thomas and Steven Molasky. They somehow talked them into it."

The institute paid Holzer to come. She programmed phrases, such as "Protect Me From What I Want," into the hotel's lighted message board.

"It went on for several days," Gaffey says. "Then Art in America came out with an issue with the sign on the cover. It was amazing. We were all kind of stunned."

Suddenly Las Vegas was viewed intellectually and aesthetically through a different lens. Maybe it was fleeting, maybe it was just about Holzer, maybe it was another tongue-in-cheek jab at the culture. But people paid attention.

More than 1,000 attendees arrive in town today for the annual Americans for the Arts convention. Several will head downtown for this evening's half-hour presentation of selections from Holzer's "Truisms" (1977-79) and "Survival" (1983-85).

She is one of three artists featured in the conference's public art presentations. Her work will be shown between Haluk Akakce's "Sky Is the Limit" and Jennifer Steinkamp's "Aria."

Holzer selected the statements from her two bodies of work and titled the piece "For Las Vegas."

The works will extend the length of the canopy, says Anne L'Ecuyer, vice president of field services for Americans for the Arts: "It's an amazing canvas for any artist to work on and a particularly good one for Jenny Holzer."

L'Ecuyer says the organization tries to incorporate public art pieces relative to the community where a conference is held. Holzer in Las Vegas made perfect sense.

Gaffey says Las Vegas was never as artistically ignorant as the world thought it to be: "Really good things have happened here. One year Allied Arts hosted a billboard art competition that was juried by Ed Ruscha."