ORANGE JOURNALISM: A juicy JR134 class project

Like most libraries, the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library at San Jose State University features many pieces of art, but unlike most libraries, this art can be a little hard to find.

The collection is called, “Recolecciones,” the Spanish word for recollections, and is meant to provide a whimsical element of discovery fitting for a library.

“We wanted to make something that was both normal ... and bizarre,” said Haun Saussy, professor of comparative literature at Yale University and one of the project’s chief collaborators. “This is something that will make people curious, something that people wouldn’t notice the first time.”

The City of San Jose chose sculpture artist Mel Chin’s idea for the “Recoleccionnes” collection from more than 20 proposals presented by other artists.

“Mel and I are old friends,” Saussy said. “We’ve known each other for at least 30 years and worked together. Mel said it sounded like fun.”

Chin, Saussy, and the rest of their group, which Saussy said consisted of about eight or ten people, started work in the fall of 1999 and did not finish until only a couple days before the library’s opening on August 1, 2003.

The collection consists of 33 pieces, many of which require some searching to discover, such as a set of mirrors hidden behind rows of books in the self help section on the 3rd floor, and others which require some extra attention to appreciate, such as a chalice with sides in the shape of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s profile on the 5th floor.

“The double chalice that shows Dr. King’s profile - you don’t feel as though this is some huge statue of Dr. King that you have to bow down to,” said Jennifer Rycenga, professor of comparative religious studies at SJSU.

Rycenga said she feels that the subtlety of the art helps to humanize the library.

“It’s like this is what it would have been like to stand next to this guy,” Rycenga said. “ I think that Dr. King is so often turned into some distant abstract saint, and to have that be on that scale is really impressive.”

For a piece called “Rosetta Screen,” found at the top of the escalator on the 2nd floor, the design of the original Rosetta Stone was etched onto a glass face and placed in front of an LED screen which displays various messages. Among them are multilingual writings from and about San Jose, a bulletin board for public announcements related to the library and hexagrams from the Chinese classic, “Book of Changes,” according to the library’s Web site.

“We spent a lot of time programming it,” Saussy said. “ ... we fed San Jose history into a database.”

For other pieces, the artists used the ideas of San Jose residents for inspiration.

“There were over 20 community meetings,” said Mary Rubin, San Jose public art manager and the project manager for the “Recolecciones” collection. “The community became a collaborator.”

For example, questionnaires were distributed asking questions such as, “What is your favorite piece of writing?” Both Saussy and Rubin recalled one woman who responded to the survey with a story from “Aesop’s Fables.” The result was the creation of a piece called, “Sour Grapes,” a glass representation of a grapevine in the form of a chandelier, which the artists based on the story.

“Mel didn’t put it in the children’s section either, that would be too obvious,” Rubin said. “He wants people to draw their own conclusions ... most people probably don’t know that the chandelier is from ‘Aesop’s Fables.’”

Rycenga organized class projects in which her students search the library for all the components of the collection, and compare their interpretations to those found on the library’s Web site.

“I honestly think the reactions that I’ve gotten over the years from students are much richer than the five sentence summaries that the artists give,” Rycenga said. “[The collection] gives an example of how you can do art that people can relate to as opposed to art that is trying to deliver some huge message.”

The subtlety and placement of the art was a main concern to the collaborators of the project, according to Rubin. She recalled having to make changes on a niche in the wall that was made to hold a large brass gong two days before the library’s opening. The change was made because the gong was meant to be placed next to the history and immigration section on the 6th floor - not the 7th floor where the niche was originally made.

“At the last minute, we did our own Sheetrock job, covered the niche on the 7th floor, and built a new one on the 6th floor,” Rubin said. “Each of the pieces had its unique challenges ... its own story.”

Although the collection was ready for the library’s opening and has not changed since, the collection continues to be improved. According to Rubin, Chin set aside part of the project’s budget for future additions, and currently there are two pieces in the works set to be installed at an undetermined date. Those who have successfully found all 33 pieces of the collection will still have something new to discover, a reward that fits the accomplishment.

“There might be things in that library that I have yet to discover,” Rycenga said.

“The idea that the library holds untold nooks and crannies - and that there’s stuff I may yet uncover there - it makes me happy to think about that.”

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Orange Journalism:
A class project by the students of Journalism 134, Online In-depth Reporting, Fall 2006, with Dr. Richard Craig.