On a cloudy, dewy morning at the Congressional Cemetery, unleashed dogs and their human companions roam freely as a man crouches between gravestones and inspects one of his 150 mirror sculptures. In March, D.C.-based artist Tommy Bobo installed the first commissioned public art for the cemetery, featuring mirrors staked into the ground at about shin level, and facing upward to reflect the sky’s changing image as well as a “wind phone.” The unplugged vintage pay phone lets visitors talk and share messages with a loved one who has died. Showing through June 30, “The Landscape Listens” is serene and emotional—until it isn’t. 

Rambunctious dogs dart through the field of mirrors and birds fly overhead, leaving the artwork to serve as their restroom. In the first week of installation, after watching several dogs run through the piece and struggle to make their way out, Bobo constructed a small white picket fence around the mirrors to form a barrier from four-legged intruders. The fence proved effective, and Bobo has seen a decrease in furry stragglers wandering through the art. 

Even if some dogs still get through, Bobo designed the sculptures to be dog-safe by making them resistant to shattering. They come off easily if knocked over. But then, there is the weather to consider. “Every week is different,” Bobo says. “Typically, I’ve been dealing with wind problems more than anything else and picking up loose pieces that blow off … It’s been a very windy month.”

Since its installation four weeks ago, Bobo has made weekly trips to the cemetery for maintenance purposes, which includes reattaching mirrors, wiping away bird droppings, and tightening loose nails. He tries to schedule his visits for days following heavy traffic to the cemetery—weekends—or after inclement weather.

This level of upkeep was part of his original proposal for the project. He predicted the need to regularly make small fixes and factored it into the commission. For many outdoor public art proposals—whether with city government, a business improvement district, or private donors—a maintenance budget is often included in the contract. 

“Having to work outside adds to a kinetic quality because the world is moving around it as opposed to coming to it,” Bobo says.

Proactivity is just as important to Bobo as reactivity when conceptualizing an outdoor piece. Four months prior to installing the “Landscape Listens,” Bobo set up different sculpture prototypes in his backyard to study how they interact with the climate. He had three iterations before landing on the correct structure for the sculpture. Still, part of creating for the outdoors is accepting the unpredictable. 

“One thing I hadn’t accounted for was pollen,” Bobo says after finding the sculpture covered in a film of yellow a couple weeks ago as D.C. began a record-high pollen count season. “We designed the whole piece through winter, so I’ve been testing it in winter and pollen was never a problem because there was no pollen.”

For artists who venture out from the confines of a gallery to produce and display their work, the unveiling is just the beginning of the artworks’ story. Outdoor pieces tend to require persistent maintenance and artists must consider what materials will best stand up to the elements. The work itself, then, becomes more dynamic, changing slightly with each adjustment.

Local mixed-media artist Nekisha Durrett, known for countless acclaimed works that highlight Black life in D.C. history, experienced a unique case with an outdoor installation for Dupont Circle a few years ago. 

Durrett’s now-removed installation, “Up til Now,” was a wooden house-like structure located across from the circle and above Connecticut Avenue’s tunnel entrance. Viewers could look through a peephole and get a glimpse of what the natural landscape looked like before the city was built. 

Installed in 2020, the piece’s timing collided with the pandemic. Due to quarantine measures, she was not permitted to take it down. “Up til Now,” which was only supposed to be up for several months, stayed up for two years before finally coming down. Durrett, who is meticulous about planning her outdoor installations—she has multiple backup sculptures in storage for her latest permanent public art piece “Queen City” in Arlington—didn’t foresee the installation extension and built the piece with materials that could not withstand two years. 

“‘Up til Now’ became a rat condo,” recalls Durrett, laughing. “I’m sure at some point, someone probably looked through the diorama and saw a whole rat family living there. It was pretty wild.”

With permanent sculptures, there are many factors when weighing aesthetics against longevity. Queer Argentinian American artist Stephanie Mercedes had to consider the materials she was using when creating her first permanent sculpture, located on the National Mall for the Art Museum of the Americas. The piece—an eagle mounted on steel poles, with outstretched wings trying to fly while wrapped in a knotted rope—was commissioned by the Organization of the American States and honors the 517 journalists who have been killed throughout the Americas since 1998. 

Typically Mercedes melts down gun bullets to transform weapons of violence into sculptures of protest. For the OAS work, the artist knew melted bullets would be used, but debated between aluminum and steel for the main structure. Both materials are suitable to hold up against the test of time, but ultimately, aluminum won due to its lightweight properties and low maintenance requirements. 

“There’s someone from the museum that’s looking after the sculpture,” Mercedes says about the piece’s upkeep, which includes an annual cleaning with a wired metal drill brush. “Sometimes leaves land on it, and they will clean it. As the artist, I like to go and check now and then to make sure everything is okay, and there isn’t any rust.”

Accompanying the eagle sculpture is a book made of stainless steel with the names of all the 517 journalists who were killed. This material was chosen because it’s softer to engrave and more reflective than other metals. 

“When people look at the book or the pages of the book, I wanted them to see themselves reflected back while they’re experiencing the art,” Mercedes says. “I think the reflective properties are powerful.”

Although a permanent structure, this sculpture presents another challenge: It’s expected to grow and change annually. Every year, during a memorial for fallen journalists, Mercedes plans to perform a melting bullet ceremony and cast small wings to attach to the back of the eagle’s main wings to symbolize the number of journalists who die each year. The book will also be updated with engravings of their names.

When OAS approached Mercedes about making the monument to be unveiled in October 2023, she knew it would be part of her ongoing fight for free speech for years to come. As for how the sculpture ages, she’s less worried about constant preservation.

“I don’t have strong feelings, because this is a sculpture that is metal and could potentially live for the next 2,000 years, so I can’t be in constant control,” Mercedes says.

Muralists Nia Keturah Calhoun and Brandon Hill share Mercedes’ laissez-faire sentiment. 

“Brandon used to say to me ‘once it’s done, it’s done, and you have to be okay with it being the public’s art—however they respond to it,’” says Calhoun, who shadowed and worked with Hill when she started painting murals three years ago. “If that’s appreciation or vandalism, that’s part of the work now.” 

Calhoun is best known for her Ketanji Brown Jackson mural above Aslin Beer Company on 14th Street NW. When painting the mural in 2022, she encountered a teenage boy who entered the construction site and told her he planned to tag the mural once completed. Calhoun was with Hill and another artist, Kate Campagna, who were assisting with the Brown Jackson piece. Eventually they got him to leave … but not for good.

“The same kid came back up in a construction vest and a hard hat and duffel bag,” Calhoun says. “He started trying to stuff our spray cans in the bag while we were actively painting.” Campagna stepped in and the boy left. But on the last day of painting the mural, Calhoun serendipitously ran into the same teen at an art show on U Street. 

“He was with his boys and they’re the skater graffiti kids, the boys who would have had my heart when I was younger,” Calhoun says. “I told him, ‘I’m disappointed. I get there’s an artists versus taggers attitude, but you got to zoom out for a second. This mural is for a Black woman and it’s made by this Black woman. I want you to think more deeply about the implications and disrespect.”

He apologized and the two had a constructive conversation about D.C. needing free areas of public space for taggers. Calhoun gave him some spray paint as a peace offering. Today, she believes this encounter has helped keep the Brown Jackson mural untagged, though she also notes there’s some luck involved, and, sometimes, an expensive add-on. 

Calhoun’s “Together” mural, which she painted with Maggie O’Neill and Lisa Marie Thalhammer, was sealed with an anti-graffiti coating, which makes the mural impenetrable. If tagged, the graffiti can easily be washed away with water. The organizations that funded the piece—DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, Shaw Main Streets, and Artbox DC—requested such, despite its steep additional cost to a standard commission. (One gallon of anti-graffiti coating can cost between $95 and $255.) 

Hill, who has been creating numerous commissioned murals all over the DMV for more than a decade—notably the Nats Park mural and Shaw’s “Washington” mural, which he made as one half of the founders of the No Kings Collective—notes that anti-graffiti paint comes with a catch. 

“Once it is sealed with the anti-graffiti paint, you can’t make any changes,” Hill says. “If damage like paint cracks or fading occurs there is no way to repair it.”

Not that Hill constantly touches up his work—typically he tries to let them exist in the space, unless absolutely necessary or requested by the commissioner. From years of learning on the job, Hill knows which paint types and brands “stretch” and “breathe” the best so the paint can withstand changes in temperatures without cracking. (Similar to a pothole, when the moisture in the air freezes and then melts it can cause cracks and damage in the paint.) Hill knows how different wall surfaces react to paint from researching technical reports meant for construction workers. Sherwin-Williams is his go-to brand. Although he loves using neon paints for indoor shows, he doesn’t use them for outdoor murals because the pigment properties quickly fade due to the neon’s synthetic creation. 

When it comes to kinetic and electrical outdoor art installations, Mercedes says, “it is a completely different beast.” Her piece, “Weight of the Rainbow,” which was first shown in June 2021 for Pride Month outside the shutdown Dean & DeLuca in Georgetown, had 928 LED-lit colored lanterns hanging from a 10,000 pound suspended structure. She hired an electrical and structural engineer to assist, which is vital when working on mixed-media projects. Once installed, every few weeks the LED lights would burn out. Mercedes found herself cutting down the line of the burned-out bulb, then resoldering a new bulb to the wires. Storms, rains, and strong winds all added to the frequent checks. Though the piece requires extra care and maintenance, Mercedes plans for it to be installed again somewhere in  D.C. during Pride this year. For the artist, celebrating the queer community in the face of increasing legal threats and violence makes the extra work worth it.

Despite differences in media and mission, each artist believes creating outdoor public art helps to democratize art. And makes it worthy of the extra upkeep necessary.

“There’s a whole group of people who don’t feel comfortable going to art spaces, those spaces aren’t necessarily welcoming to them,” Durrett, who has artwork displayed at both the Phillips Collection and the Baltimore Museum of Art, says. “I really like public art because it’s available to everyone. I think it can surprise someone who’s used to taking the same path every day and suddenly there’s this new artwork to add to their interpretation of their everyday environment.”