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The call was open to artists from local to international, who applied on every scale. The work is to be installed by fall 2017.

Part of Edmonton’s Percent for Art policy — stipulating that one per cent of qualifying construction budgets for municipal infrastructure be spent building and maintaining public art — the commission was the Edmonton Arts Council’s first with survey-driven, public consultation. The work of six finalists received more than 3,300 responses, which were considered during the juried selection process.

EAC’s public art director Katherine Kerr said processing the interaction added a lot of work. But “given it was Edmonton’s largest commission ever, $1 million, and also on a site people don’t expect to see public art, we thought we would open it up.

“We weren’t looking for favourites; we were looking for feedback. It started slow, then just went viral on social media.”

Kerr explains: “In the selection committee, when we got down to the last few, the chair randomly, from the big tome of responses, pulled out comments from the community as a way of generating more conversation.

“It was very successful, and it’s amazing how many thoughtful responses we received. Of course we got the standard, ‘Why do we have public art, it’s a waste of money!’ responses, but they were by far in the minority. It was very encouraging.”

The multimedia artist, born in 1960 in Dinslaken, Germany, studied sculpture at the State Academy of Fine Arts in Stuttgart, and has been responsible for a number of public works around the world, including in Norway, Poland and all over Germany.