project overview

Everybody’s Talkin | Audubon Park

Greely Myatt creates multi-functional seating in Audubon Park for conversations and beauty.

“Whether its one individual or a group of people, every voice has a platform to speak up and share their opinion. ”

Myatt was commissioned to create a sculpture series in Audubon Park as a continuance of former bodies of work that engaged with dialogue and conversations, like Cloudy Thoughts which he created with UAC in 2008. He mentioned that he wanted the concept to be “straightforward…so when people come to the park they already know what to do”.

There are several seating areas that scale from one-person seating to a multi-person stage, which is reflective of community voices. Whether it’s one individual or a group of people, every voice has a platform to speak up and share their opinion. On each sculpted steel structure are open dialogue bubbles to encourage continuous conversation, as if each speech bubble belongs to whoever interacts with the benches or communal stage. Myatt also incorporates lighting features in each of the platformed structures with solar-powered lights that light at night as crescent moon-shaped speech bubbles. Everybody’s Talkin is a great example of Myatt’s sculpture and lighting skillsets creating an opportunity to interact and elevate community voices.

about the artist

Greely Myatt

Greely Myatt was born and educated in Aberdeen, MS. He currently lives and works in Memphis, TN, where he is a Professor of Art at The University of Memphis. His sculptures and installations have been exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions across the United States, Europe, and Japan.  He has received grants and fellowships from the Tennessee Arts Commission, The University of Memphis, The University of Georgia, Alternate Roots, Atlanta, and received the Mississippi Arts and Letters Visual Arts Award in 1994. Myatt was an exchange artist to Israel in 1998. In 2009, work from twenty years of living and working in Memphis was exhibited across the city in nine separate venues. His work has been reviewed in Art in America, ArtNews, Sculpture Magazine, and in online versions of ArtForum and Juxtapoz Magazine. He is represented by Sandler Hudson Gallery, Atlanta, and David Lusk Gallery, Memphis.