Columbus Mileposts | March 14, 1984: Maligned airport artwork got no respect - at first

Roy Lichtenstein’s Brushstrokes in Flight sculpture was the Rodney Dangerfield of public art in Columbus after it arrived at Port Columbus on March 14, 1984. It just got no respect.

The day after it arrived, Columbus Citizen-Journal columnist Joe Dirck wrote about a caller who said the piece should be called Drunken Sailor.

He wrote, “I stared at a Brushstrokes picture for a while, letting my eyes slip out of focus, and … By golly, she’s right.”

The tall aluminum sculpture was commissioned by the Columbus Civic Arts Advisory Committee in 1982 for $150,000.

It was installed in 1984 in an isolated courtyard outside the Port Columbus terminal and was moved the next year to a parking lot, where it sat in the weather until 1998, when it was moved inside to its current location at the entrance to Concourse B.

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On May 16, 1988, Mayor Dana “Buck” Rinehart announced that he was giving Brushstrokes to Genoa, Italy, in return for that city’s 1955 gift to Columbus of the giant statue of Christopher Columbus that stands outside City Hall.

The move caused a furor in the Columbus arts community and was rescinded in the face of stiff opposition from the City Council.

The Dispatch commented in an editorial, “All at once Brushstrokes, which was never everyone’s favorite sculpture, seemed to rank right up there with Mom and apple pie.”

Suggestions for Mileposts that will run this bicentennial year can be sent to: Gerald Tebben, Box 82125, Columbus, OH 43202, or email gtebben@columbus.rr.com.