Public Art App for the subway system collection

For last so many years one of New York City’s most underrated ‘public art’ museums has also, ironically, been the one with the most visitors by far, roughly millions daily: the subway system.

For two decades 1985, the Arts for Transit program courtesy of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has commissioned permanent works by artists - both lesser-known and well-known for the commuter rail system and also the subway. But locating these, in a system that can feel like a lab-mouse maze at sometimes, has never really been easy.

So the transport authority started working with a Portland- based mobile software company several months ago. It has just announced its first ever licensed app to act as a guide to the hundreds of permanent works throughout the stations, and to a dozen more or so in the Metro North as well as Long Island Rail Road systems.

Are you keen to find Robert Wilson? Well, he is there in Coney Island. Doug & Mike Starn? Head to South Ferry. Is it Maya Lin? Try Penn Station. You can find Vito Acconci at two different places, including the Yankee Stadium station in the Bronx, where his ‘Wall-Slide’ (2002) makes the station look as if it’s transforming itself into an unusual archaeological dig.

The MTA Arts for Transit director, Sandra Bloodworth, states the app is yet a work-in-progress – will provide information either by artist featured - abstract painter Al Held, illustrator Yumi Heo, Elizabeth Murray, Roy Lichtenstein, Sol Lewitt or by subway line.

It also offers maps some of the major stations and guided tours, along with video-audio pieces about each artist and his or her work. (It can well be synced before moving into mobile phone dead-zone stations or interactively employed with location-based help at most of the above-ground stations and those wired.) According to Ms. Bloodworth, art really does something (special) in an unconventional setting like the subway, giving a touch of dignity to your journey, carrying the whole collection right in the palm of your hand.