A project of the Fairmount Park Art Association, the Museum Without Walls audio tour tells the stories behind 51 works of public art in a series of 35 stops. The project has some extremely cool technical features, but it also can be accessed by anyone capable of dialing a phone, at 215-399-9000.
Philadelphia has more outdoor sculpture than any other city in the United States, says Penny Balkin Bach, the art association's executive director. Yet even longtime residents can find something new on these three-minute audio segments.
Three generations of Calders are featured: The Shakespeare Memorial and Swann Memorial Fountain, both on Logan Square, are by Alexander Stirling Calder; Three Discs, One Lacking, is a 1968 work by his son, Alexander Calder. And if you look through the frame of the Lacking disc, the statue of William Penn atop City Hall, by the artist's grandfather, Alexander Milne Calder, comes into view.
Some artwork on the tour offers familiar images (Randolph Rogers' Abraham Lincoln, for example, and Frederic Remington's Cowboy).
Others are on opposite ends of what many experts might consider a continuum of great works. (The Thinker, by Auguste Rodin, vs. Rocky, by Thomas Schomberg).
And even potentially ho-hum stops become fascinating in light of the information offered.
Take, for example, the James A. Garfield Monument, created in 1895 by Augustus Saint-Gaudens and located on Kelly Drive south of the Girard Avenue Bridge.
The 20th president of the United States, Garfield is perhaps best remembered for his death. He was shot July 2, 1881, in the waiting room of the Baltimore & Potomac Railroad depot in Washington, and died of blood poisoning 10 days later.
