When you hear the word"art", you might think of paintings in museums. But art isn't always inside, and you don't always have to pay to see it. In fact, you can see some really interesting art for free in public spaces around the world.
Some public art doesn't just make a place look beautiful. In Las Palmitas, a town in Mexico, people worked together with a street art group to paint their houses in bright colors. The result was a large painting that can be seen from kilometers away. As people worked together on it, they saw how the art brought happiness to their neighborhood."In the morning, you wake up and look around and see the colors,"said a local man."It's very beautiful."
Public art can also send a message. In 2014, British artists Paul Cummins and Tom Piper placed many ceramic (陶瓷) flowers on the ground around the Tower of London. The flowers represented (代表) those who died in World War I. The artists wanted visitors to think about and remember those people by doing that. Months later, the flowers were sold, and the money went to people in need.
▲ In 2010, the Icelandic artist Bjargey Ólafsdóttir created the Red Polar Bear in Iceland. It showed the red outline (轮廓) of a polar bear on the snow. Ólafsdóttir wanted to make people think about the polar bear and how its environment is changing.
Of course, sometimes public art is there just because it can make people happy. One example is the Floralis Genérica in Buenos Aires, a large metal (金属的) flower in a pool. It opens every morning and closes every evening. It's wonderful.
