The author traces the attempt to establish a public process for art funding in Gainesville, Florida.

In December 1983, Representative Jon Mills asked Leaders of Government in Cooperation (LOGIC) to form a committee of volunteers dedicated to showcasing the arts in Alachua County, Florida. This committee created and incorporated the Florida Arts Celebration (FAC) as an independent, 501 (c) (3) not-for-profit corporation (Florida Arts Celebration 1986a).

In late 1985, the Florida Arts Celebration began its first major visual arts initiative. Its Long Range Policy and Planning Committee had recommended that it undertake a special, ongoing program to benefit the community of Gainesville, Florida. An art in public places was selected, and in early 1986 an Art In Public Places Committee (AIPP) - of which the author was a member - chaired by Paula Criser, wife of then University of Florida (UF) President Marshall Criser, was established. In late May 1986, this committee brought Cesar Trasobares, then executive director of the Art in Public Places program in Metropolitan Dade County, Florida, to Gainesville to educate the committee regarding procedures for selecting artists and identifying potential sites. Trasobares helped AIPP establish four committees: project, education, public liaison and fund raising. He made a slide presentation of public art in existing programs in other communities to the FAC Board of Directors, city and county elected officials, and other local leaders to introduce them to the possibilities of such a program. It was during this initial slide presentation that he introduced the community to the differences between site-specific art designed in collaboration with the architects and taking into account the structure, grounds and users of the building, and plop art (art purchased and literally plopped down without any particular regard for the site or structure).

CONTENTS
The celebration celebrates (for a while).
The public debate intensifies.
Epilogue.