Hats off to Michael Townsend. Four years of living, building, and interacting in a forgotten space in the Providence Place Mall, a grandly subversive bit of art from this so-called “public artist” in a room without a view, it was undeniably the kind of local news story guaranteed to make your day, maybe even your week. I can say without a trace of sarcasm or irony that this was indeed the kind of art (whether classified as public, performance, temporary, an installation, etc.) that was keen, provocative, and yup, humorous. When caught, Townsend went down for the count appropriately, offering up a possibly sincere mea culpa, resisting the predictable prank-in-yer-face antics or MIT-styled faux revolutionary crapola. Give the man credit for a sublimely conceived and consummately executed vision, and give him a nod for the all too infrequent ability of conveying a sense of aesthetics to those of us out here sweating our way through our daily middle class machinations.
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