James D. Watts Jr.
Tulsa World Scene Reporter
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Since its founding in 2012, Tulsa’s Urban Core Art Project has enlivened the downtown landscape with temporary public art installations including evocations of fireflies and sculptures built of locally harvested saplings.
The newest installation, which officially opens to the public Sept. 25, is “Assembly,” a work comprising 21 sculptures and three benches that will occupy the Plaza of the Americas, 702 S. Denver Ave., now through Sept. 25, 2026.
“Assembly” is the work of Tulsa Artist Fellowship alum Richard Zimmerman, who came to Tulsa in 2019 and remained as a fellow through 2021. He continued to live and work in Tulsa after his fellowship concluded.
The sculptures that make up the bulk of the installation were built from thousands of discarded and recycled plastic and metal objects that Zimmerman gathered from around the Tulsa area and affixed to metal armatures. Each sculpture was then wrapped in fiberglass cast tape, the kind typically used to mend broken bones.
The resulting works suggest organic shapes — plantings, weeds and shrubs. “Assembly” responds to the plaza’s existing features while introducing new paths for pedestrians. The addition of wooden benches softens and enriches the park’s accommodations. By using found objects, the sculptures connect the park to the city’s broader metabolism.
Zimmerman is an interdisciplinary artist whose work encompasses sculpture, photography, sound, video and drawing. He holds a Master of Fine Arts degree in studio art from Cornell University and bachelor’s in painting from Pratt Institute. His work has been exhibited at various venues, including Miami Art Basel, Artlot, Shore Institute for Contemporary Art, Signal Gallery, Royal Nonesuch Gallery, and Center on Contemporary Art in Seattle.
“Assembly” is the fifth project presented by Urban Core Art Project. The program began in 2015 with “Tulsa Patterns (Firefly Reference)” by Kansas City artist James Woodfill, which was fitting dozens of randomly blinking lights on buildings at the corner of Third Street and Detroit Avenue. This installation remained place for a year, while the second project, “Trace,” a motion-activated, solar light display at Tulsa’s Center of the Universe by Tulsa artists Grace Grothaus Grimm and Geoffrey Hicks, remained active from 2016 to 2019.
The third UCAP installation was “Prairie Schooners” by Patrick Dougherty, three large sculptural forms made of saplings and branches, which occupied the Chapman Centennial Green, 601 S. Boston Ave., for nearly two years from early 2018 to late 2019. Another Tulsa Artist Fellowship alum, Rachel Hayes, created the fourth UCAP work, “Reflection Mode,” a large-scale fabric installation that brought color and form to the former Church of Christ, Scientist building at 924 S. Boulder Ave.
UCAP has dedicated this project to the memory of Casey Cooper and acknowledges generous funding from private donors and foundations, including the Mervin Bovaird Foundation, the Gerald H. Westby Jr. Foundation, and the Ruskin Art Club.
For more information on the Urban Core Art Project: ucaptulsa.com.
james.watts@tulsaworld.com
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James D. Watts Jr.
Tulsa World Scene Reporter
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