Arts Huntsville seeking local artist for a cool project at Legacy Park

Attention local artists: Arts Huntsville — in collaboration with the City of Huntsville Parks and Recreation — needs you for a project at Legacy Park!

The selected local artist’s work will be one of four fitness-based public art installations to become a part of Huntsville’s landscape thanks to a partnership between the City of Huntsville, Arts Huntsville and the National Fitness Campaign. Read more for the details:

More on the project

In May, the Huntsville City Council approved a $4.6 million construction services contract with Consolidated Construction Company to build Legacy Park near the new Johnson Legacy Center on Cecil Fain Drive on the old J.O. Johnson High School property.

One of the many features of the park will be a concrete pad for a future National Fitness Campaign (NFC) Fitness Court installation. NFC’s Fitness Court is an innovative outdoor bodyweight circuit training center created to improve quality of life in cities, schools, parks and trails across America.

Designed for adults of all ages and abilities, each Fitness Court provides a free full body workout in just seven minutes. Users will be able to rotate through all seven Fitness Court zones, leveraging their bodyweight at different angles and levels of resistance to improve performance over time.

Two of the fitness courts will feature vinyl appliqués of limited-edition artwork by late renowned artists Keith Haring (John Hunt Park) and Jean-Michel Basquiat (Apollo Park).

Local artists may now apply to the Huntsville Public Art Program to compete to design one of the two additional fitness court installations, supported in part by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Alabama. 

How artists can apply

So, now that you’re familiar with the project itself, here is how you can apply for the project:

• Artists can begin the RFQ process on the Arts Huntsville website.
• This initial Legacy Park RFQ process will select up to three semifinalists. Each semifinalist will receive a sketch fee to submit proposals for artwork to be digitally printed on the Fitness Court’s vinyl wrap. 
• The final artwork may be either digital art or a high-resolution image of work produced in another 2D media. 
• The selected artist will receive a commission of $5,000 to produce the site-specific final artwork.
• The Legacy Park Fitness Court is scheduled to be installed in spring of 2023 and will also include an artist bio and photo printed on the vinyl wrap. 
• Artists must be 18 years of age and reside within the Arts Huntsville service area. 
• The deadline for submissions is Sept. 25, 2022. A second RFQ seeking artists to create work for the Fitness Court at California Street Park will be released at a later date. 
• A video orientation for interested artists will be released in early September 2022 on the Arts Huntsville YouTube Channel. 
• Questions can be directed to Arts Huntsville Public Art Program Manager Jennifer Johnson at publicart@artshuntsville.org.

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