Land Art Generator Initiative (Society for Cultural Exchange)

Anything an artist can do in paint, they can now do in solar!

With the advent of solar panel customization, art in public space stands ready for a revolution. LAGI Solar Mural® artworks celebrate local culture, provide new opportunities for artists, and make communities more vibrant and livable, all while reducing the carbon footprint of our cities as part of the solution to climate change.

San Antonio, Texas is the Solar Mural artwork capital of the world with two installed projects and one under development. The most recent Solar Mural artwork was unveiled in Jackson, Wyoming in August 2023.

We work with communities and site owners to help identify local partners, facilitate calls to artists, deliver public outreach, educational programming, and co-design, assist with budgeting, identify ideal sites, identify appropriate solar technology, facilitate the design process, provide detailed fabrication drawings, and coordinate fabrication and installation.

The LAGI artwork by Berlin-based artist and architect Riccardo Mariano takes the form of a 100-foot-tall triumphal arch and serves as a gateway to Houston’s East End / Segundo Barrio neighborhood. It is also an interactive time-measuring device that creates a thread between the celestial and the terrestrial by beaming sunlight onto the ground plane of Guadalupe Plaza Park. Each beam of light is uniquely composed throughout the seasons and hours of the day by the geometry of the artwork, which responds to the specific latitude and longitude of Houston.

Incorporating solar modules into the south-facing exterior of the sculpture, the Arch will generate approximately 400,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity each year, powering the nearby Talento Bilingüe de Houston (TBH) and the surrounding neighborhood. The artwork will also provide 25,000 square feet of shade to activate the park throughout the year.

The Land Art Generator, Idia'Dega, Olorgesailie Maasai Women Artisans (OMWA) partnership is bringing aesthetically and culturally relevant renewable energy infrastructure to the Maasai community in Olorgesailie Kenya.

The Maasai women who have been working closely with Tereneh Mosley and Idia'Dega: Elegant Ethical Apparel — A Global Eco-Design Collaboration have taken the lead in designing creative installations that have the added benefit of generating clean and renewable energy for their community.

The outcome of this participatory community design model is as much about the cultural exchange as it is about the clean energy infrastructure outcome. The goal is to provide a better infrastructure that will help to support the creative process and sustainability of the community into the future.

This unique summer camp gives kids an education in energy science, climate science, art, design, and solar power installation. The final outcome is a built and functioning solar artwork designed by the campers to power their community!

Art + Energy Camp provides project-based learning and STEAM education, giving young people the skills they will need to thrive in the 21st century economy, including science, technology, engineering, art, math, documentation and communication, social media, design process management, project management, and creative problem solving.

https://www.artenergycamp.org/

WindNest is a unique renewable energy installation designed as a safe and educational public amenity. The installation demonstrates the potential for our sustainable infrastructures to be joyful contributions to creative placemaking. Walking through WindNest, visitors experience a set of moving cloud formations overhead.

As they linger on their way through this beautiful place, they discover that the pods above them are at that very moment generating clean electricity with a mix of wind and solar technologies.

Designed by Trevor Lee (suprafutures), WindNest was an entry to the LAGI 2010 design competition and was originally conceived for a site in Abu Dhabi. With the support of Pittsburgh-based foundations The Heinz Endowment and the Hillman Foundation it was redesigned for an urban context and was installed in 2022 as part of New Substance's SEE MONSTER project, part of the UK Unboxed festival.

An invited design competition for regenerative artworks in the gorgeous landscape of New Mexico near Galisteo.

We were invited by Chip Conley and the incredible team at the Modern Elder Academy (MEA) who are stewarding a 2,566 acre parcel known as Saddleback Ranch in an exemplary way. MEA’s vision of a regenerative community is conceived holistically to include the regeneration of soil, regeneration of ecosystems and habitats, regeneration of community, and regeneration of the soul of each individual. This work is in support of MEA’s larger mission as a school dedicated to helping people navigate life transitions in midlife and beyond.

Beginning in late 2023, MEA’s Saddleback Ranch campus will begin hosting workshops, building on the curriculum developed at the original campus in Baja, Mexico. MEA participants will learn from the sustainably managed equine landscape and engage with the selected artwork from the LAGI MEA design competition.

The consortium including Glasgow City Council, Scottish Canals, and BIGG Regeneration with the assistance of ecoartscotland brought together overseas and Glasgow-based teams to research and develop site-specific Land Art Generator Initiative (LAGI) artwork concept proposals for Port Dundas. Port Dundas is a focus for urban regeneration with a strong creative dimension. LAGI Glasgow formed part of Glasgow’s Green Year 2015 and continued into 2016, Scotland’s Year of Innovation, Architecture, and Design—engaging local communities as well as those interested in art and innovation in renewable energy.

Willimantic Whitewater Partnership (WWP) has recently remediated a prominent site in the heart of Willimantic, Connecticut and prepared it for development. Soon it will be home to a new whitewater park and other public amenities that WWP envisions will be powered with on-site renewable energy.

LAGI is working with WWP in partnership with the Institute for Sustainable Energy (ISE) at Eastern Connecticut State University, and the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD) Office of the Arts.

The WWP site offers the perfect opportunity to integrate renewable energy, with a richness of resources, including hydro, solar, and wind. The site, in such a prominent location in downtown Willimantic, is ideally situated to be a catalyst for economic and community development.

The invited competition resulted in a winning project, Rio Iluminado, which will be installed to power the park and engage the public about the beauty of renewable energy.