Littauer Stairwell Beautification Challenge

September 2, 2022

Stairwell Beautification Poster

Littauer needs YOU to submit ideas for wall art in the stairwell! Please read below for your chance to decide what is included!

The Littauer Beautification Challenge

All members of our community (e.g., staff, graduate students, undergraduates, faculty, visitors, lecturers) are invited to participate in a challenge. Please help us add artistically, intellectually, personally, and institutionally meaningful artworks to the Littauer stairwell (the four curved walls between the lobby and the second floor). We are inviting you to contribute ideas, but you will not have to create the final item. The designs can be of many types, but each should have all of the following characteristics:

  1. Size: Can be represented in about a 2.5 by 2.5 foot two-dimensional object (or connected objects). The wall curvature and the ability to see the artwork details are the constraints.
  2. Relevance: Is of relevance to our community as part of our intellectual field, thought, or teaching. Examples include: (a) a graph from an article by a current or past member of our department; (b) a figure from an article or book that has been important in a course; (c) an artistic cover of a significant book; (d) an imaginative depiction of a concept in economics (this may be challenging but there are creative people in our department).
  3. Artistry: Must have some artistry. For example, graphs can be colored or the underlying data can be re-used to provide a more artistic visualization; data and concepts can be represented in creative ways. Ingenious infographics from other fields abound. A motivation for our project was W.E.B. Du Bois’s work. The New York Times has been using ingenious infographics; see Sahil Chinoy’s website and their 2021 year-end review,
  4. Meaning: The person proposing the design must write at least one meaningful sentence, and at most two paragraphs, about the design that motivates its inclusion in the collection and that may be displayed alongside the installation. The person’s name can (but need not) be included. The proposal can be personally meaningful.

The Committee hopes that the collection will reflect the diversity of economics even if it raises questions about current or prior lack of diversity in terms of individuals and ideas.

You are being asked to suggest one or more ideas. You should feel free to submit a mock-up, but the final piece will likely be commissioned. We plan to have a rotating installation and to have challenges again at a future date. We will also explore the creation of a digital component to the collection that includes background materials accessible via QR codes.

Timetable: Proposals are due by Monday, October 10, 2022 and should be sent to gwallace@fas.harvard.edu. Winners will be selected by the LB Committee and announced about four weeks later. Please direct questions to any member of the committee.

The Littauer Beautification Committee: Co-Chairs: Winnie van Dijk, Claudia Goldin; Members: Jenna Anders, Adrien Bilal, Sahil Chinoy, Yannai Gonczarowski, Shengwu Li, Damari Rosado, Genevieve Wallace