Free Basket is a large scale art work which is made of concrete, steel, paint, plastic, located in the Indianapolis Museum of Art. It is commissioned by the Museum with the funds provided by Griffith Foundation Gift. It is drawing on the form of an international basketball court, blue and red steel arcs are the main structure of the sculpture. The arcs are irregularly placed in different direction. It makes the apparent the trajectory of a bouncing ball. The ground is made of white, yellow and green tiny plastic triangle. It clearly shows that there is a boundary between the court and land.
Different bouncing ball paths make that Free Basket just like a real game. It is also an architecture, not only a sculpture. Strategy is the key characteristic of basketball game. There are numerous strategies in a game and different strategies combining together will be a new strategy. There would be countless changes. Usually, mangers would write on the strategy board like this to give the signals to players to attack or deference in the game. Besides, there is a long history and culture of basketball in Indiana, so Los Carpinteros decided to use this idea.
Usually, different artworks involve different messages, some are political, some are invisible, some are obvious. In this work there are many personal opinions involved, they do not want to share them directly and let audiences just look at the work in their own angle as there are different arcs, audiences might choose different arcs (different strategies).And they changed the basketball court into an artwork where a place we also play, there would be a new version of traditional thing, it might change the thinking of audiences.
Besides,there are many drivers in Indiana. It is located near a bridge, it hopes to attract the attention of drivers to notice the artwork and inspire them.
Personally, it really inspires me that making something which is traditional and present in another new version could be successful and artistic. Basketball court where we usually go when we were small, but most of us don’t think what the messages and views could be interpreted behind it.
