Hope springs eternal that design by Andy Warhol for Tacoma Dome's roof might be used someday

It seemed a rather nonchalant way to apply for an art commission worth a quarter of a million dollars.

“Enclosed is a rather short proposal for the Tacoma Dome,” stated the letter from Andy Warhol Studio.

“We have also included an acetate of the flower Andy would like to see on the dome,” wrote Vincent Fremont on the pop artist’s behalf.

“We are sorry this is being submitted at the last minute but Andy’s schedule has been incredibly busy.”

That one paragraph sent to the City of Tacoma on Jan. 26, 1982, entered Warhol in the 1-percent-for-the-arts competition associated with construction of the Tacoma Dome. The Dome’s $28 million budget triggered a $280,000 art set-aside (more than $550,000 in 2011 dollars). That and the prominence of the building were enough to attract proposals from both well- and little-known artists, both regionally and nationally.

Warhol wasn’t selected by the panel of judges that included architect Michael Graves and art curators from Miami and Denver. Eventually, Stephen Antonakos’ neon art proposal that was intended for the Dome’s roof was altered and moved inside. A rather pedestrian blue triangle design was painted on the roof instead. And Tacoma went through a bitter and embarrassing debate over public art that led to a referendum repealing the city’s public arts program.

Fifteen years passed before the public art program was reinstated in diminished form, and there are still scars and hard feelings from the Dome art debacle. No one knows the legacy of those events better than Amy McBride, the City of Tacoma’s arts administrator. So she admits to some nervousness when answering questions about an idea she’s been investigating: Could Warhol’s pop art “Flower for Tacoma Dome” be installed 30 years after it was rejected?

“I would love to see it on the Tacoma Dome,” McBride said. She said having the work of a “blue-chip artist” on such a prominent structure “would be an amazing gateway to the city.”

“It would be an iconic element on the Tacoma skyline,” Tacoma Art Museum director Stephanie Stebich said. It also might be the only public work by one of the leading artists of the 20th century.

“Warhol said, ‘Once you “got” pop, you could never see a sign the same way again. And once you thought pop, you could never see America the same way again.’ … Well, you could never see Tacoma the same way again after that kind of addition,” Stebich said.

Warhol died in 1987 at age 56, but his status as an artist who created in numerous media has not faded. He has far exceeded his own estimate that “everyone will be world famous for 15 minutes.”

Noting what it dubbed his “artfully cultivated celebrity,” the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts in New York summarizes Warhol this way: “His omnivorous curiosity resulted in an enormous body of work that spanned every available medium and most importantly contributed to the collapse of boundaries between high and low culture.”

“Flower for Tacoma Dome,” actually two different versions, are not insignificant works. Modern art dealer Coskun Fine Art says they led to one of Warhol’s most-recognized creations.

“These prints, ‘Flower for Tacoma Dome,’ are based on a hybrid flower created by Warhol. ‘Daisy’ is inspired by this proposal.”

McBride hopes she can win permission to use the work because that’s what the artist intended. Still, knowing the expense of such a plan – repainting a 5-acre roof with a massive pop-art flower – McBride said it could be done only the next time the roof is replaced.

“If we were to do it when the roof needs to be refurbished, then most of the costs would be embedded in that,” she said.

The occasional $150,000 cleanings that are done (and should be done again soon) are not enough to trigger a change in design because the protective coating will not accept paint. And Tacoma Dome manager Rob Henson said the nearly three-decade-old roof surface is still holding up. But when a new roof is needed – something the city estimates could cost between $3 million and $5 million – Henson is all for Warhol.

“I love the idea,” he said. “Absolutely.”

As noted, Warhol’s proposal didn’t win the 1982 competition. But each of four finalists was paid $4,500 to prepare a formal proposal, and the city retained ownership of submitted artwork. The two lithographs Warhol submitted have been appraised at $70,000 and are displayed in the Greater Tacoma Convention & Trade Center.

McBride has made informal contact with the Andy Warhol Museum in his native Pittsburgh and said they were excited. But the rights to the work are held by the Warhol Foundation in New York.

After several attempts for comment from the foundation staff, I received this from director of licensing Michael Hermann: “I regret that we can’t provide you with further comments pertaining to a hypothetical proposal lacking details received from an uninvolved party. As indicated previously, should the City of Tacoma submit a formal written proposal, we would be more than happy to review and discuss with them.”

OK then. So dealing with the foundation might be the hard part. But McBride thinks the city has a responsibility as good stewards of this particular work to do what it can to place it where it was intended to be – not hanging on a wall but in public on one of the largest canvases in the world.

“There is a recognized intention that Warhol wanted it on the Tacoma Dome,” she said.

Peter Callaghan: 253-597-8657

peter.callaghan@thenewstribune.com

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Twitter: @CallaghanPeter