About a month ago, beloved New York non-profit Creative Time announced that Jane Cooney would serve as its new CEO. Connie replaces Justine Ludwig, who has served as CEO of Creative Time since her appointment in 2018, and comes from the Times Square Alliance, another major organization delivering ambitious public art in the city. Connie worked at Creative Time before Times Square Arts, and we spoke to hear more about her new job and her thoughts on public art in general.
You’re returning to Creative Time after nearly seven years at Times Square Arts. I can see the ways in which the two jobs are similar, as they both program ambitious public art, but what are the main differences you can point to between the two organisations?
Creative Time and Times Square Arts are creatives in their own right! Both programs are designed around inviting artists to think bigger, push the boundaries of their practice and respond to the landscape of our city as well as the contemporary cultural moment. I am grateful that across these very different organizations, I have been able to work with artists and support the realization of bold, ambitious, and timely projects for a broad and diverse audience in New York City.
Times Square is an extraordinary place that sees an average of 250,000 people in one day, where you can’t really make any assumptions about anyone’s interest in art, which really inspired me to expand my thinking about audience and accessibility. Instead, Creative Time follows artists, who move around the city and sometimes beyond (and in one case, even into outer space), bringing their vision to life—a practice I’m excited to delve into again, push it further, and intertwine with what I learned from Times Square.
At Creative Time, I helped Nick Cave’s investigation Heard • New York (2013) At Grand Central Station, Kara Walker accuracy (2014) in the former Domino Sugar factory and Duke Riley’s Fly at night (2016) at the Brooklyn Navy Yard – three of the most beloved pieces in recent memory. What makes a Creative Time piece great?
Highly creative project time is when you can really feel the chemistry between the artist with the vision, the bold idea, and the space in which their project is located. Our artists’ projects can take many shapes and forms, but ultimately they are unexpected, involve risk and experimentation and push us to see ourselves and our world in new ways. It leaves an indelible mark – I can still smell the sugar melting in that giant warehouse; Hear the rustle of raffia and booming drums in Vanderbilt Hall; Watch the lights form in the night sky over the East River, as the bell rings calling the birds home.
Last year, the statue of Thomas J. Price in Times Square became a lightning rod after Fox News went after it. How has this controversy shaped the way you think about public art in these political end times?
This experience has reaffirmed for me the necessity of public art and artists opening dialogues about our most pressing and unresolved social and political issues, especially in this divisive climate. Artists like Thomas J. Price create space for difficult conversations, forcing us to grapple with tensions between multiple realities and find new entry points for engaging with the most polarizing topics. The presentation of his work in Times Square and the responses it received ultimately became a psychological portrait of our ongoing and historical relationship with race, gender, and identity, holding up a mirror to who we are and what we value, as individuals and as a society.
The experience also crystallized the challenges and potential of public dialogue online and in person, and how the two can intertwine. In this case, hate-fueled online chatter sparked a wave of solidarity and celebration around the work, ultimately leading to rational, critical dialogue on social media, in the press, and on the ground. Along the way, our public art ambassadors have been having increasingly meaningful conversations with visitors in Times Square.
I worked with both Anne Pasternak, who was art director and head of Creative Time, and Nato Thompson as chief curator, both of whom are major figures in the art world. What did you take from each of them as leaders, and where do you intend to move away from them?
Those were incredibly formative years for me, and really shaped who I am and how I see the world. Working under such charismatic leadership and with visionary artists of that period of “creative time” opened my eyes to the possibilities of public art, the ways in which artists can become agents of change within our society as a whole and how to foster an artist-led organizational culture. What I learned from each of them and my many talented colleagues from that time period continues to inspire me and drive my mission to capture the full range of Creative Time magic in this next chapter—from the bold, beautiful, and attention-grabbing to the socially engaged and disruptive.
I have no doubt that an astonishing amount of bureaucracy goes into the operation of both Times Square Arts and Creative Time. Does working with a routine energize you or is it something you’ve just learned how to navigate with minimal sweat?
Is it weird to say that routine energizes me? Because at this point I really enjoy a challenge, and at the heart of every seemingly impossible project is some kind of bureaucratic work – from navigating the municipal codes and civic structures of our city to the negotiations and strategic partnerships that can expand it, and the delicate politics and unnerving moments that live in between.
Because Creative Time often revitalizes or opens up spaces in new ways for our artists’ commissions—whether it’s bringing the audience into an abandoned 130-year-old sugar factory or staging a politically themed haunted house in a former military station—the process typically entails a lot of behind-the-scenes stamps and approvals, and a high-stakes visit from the FDNY’s Fire Marshall moments before the unveiling. I’m still in shock along with my colleagues who worked to secure all of our temporary gathering permits; And I’ll never forget getting a phone call from the FAA on opening night Fly at night To see if the barometric altitude of the pigeons’ performance would interfere with LaGuardia’s flight paths; Or the long hours he spent at the Department of Health’s mobile food inspection facility in Maspeth, Queens, certifying Spencer Finch’s solar-powered ice cream truck. Ultimately, through all of these experiences, you build relationships and a constellation of people to call when you face your next challenge.
I started out doing one-night art installations at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. What remains with you from that experience?
This was a special time, and in retrospect, I had everything to love my job now. We would dream up with the artists, bend the rules a little, and thanks to the bureaucratic guidance of my friend, collaborator, and DJ-turned-Episcopal priest, we would organize temporary, site-specific installations inside a Gothic-style cathedral every month, playing music and throwing parties. I remember thinking at the time: “I don’t know exactly what this is, but I know I love it, and I need to do more of it.”
Creative Time has been around since 1974. How do you think it manages to stay fresh? How do you intend to position it so that it remains relevant in the decades to come?
Letting artists lead is why Creative Time continues to remain relevant and chart pioneering paths forward. By supporting visionary artists who speak out about the issues of our time and allowing them to dream big, you’ll always find yourself one step ahead. As we prepare to continue this work for another 50 years, Creative Time will need to remain nimble, responsive, and willing to embrace the unexpected and play real risks with our artists, partners, and audiences.
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