Installer of huge HOPE sculpture questioned by security prior to the DNC

Hope you don't get detained by security. Shepard Fairey wasn’t the only artist to get caught in the tentacles of DNC security. The week before the convention, Alan Jones, owner of high-end art installation company Ship Art Denver, got an exciting rush job to deliver sculptor Robert Indiana’s “HOPE” –...

By Jared Jacang Maher

September 2, 2008

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Hope you don't get detained by security.

Shepard Fairey wasn’t the only artist to get caught in the tentacles of DNC security. The week before the convention, Alan Jones, owner of high-end art installation company Ship Art Denver, got an exciting rush job to deliver sculptor Robert Indiana’s “HOPE” – a remake of his 1976 pop icon “LOVE” piece in Philadelphia’s JFK plaza – to the sidewalk in front of the Pepsi Center. But when Jones went down to the stadium to take photos of the site, he was quickly grabbed by security officials and questioned for nearly an hour about his intentions.

Despite nearly missing picking his daughter up from school, Jones isn’t bitter about the mix-up, especially since the sculpture turned out to be such a hit with delegates and journalists. “I think the beauty of the piece is that Indiana tweaked LOVE just enough to define this new generation and the greater dialog that’s going on,” he says. “Conceptually it says something more than just what it is.”

The message for the new era? It is possible to go from Love to Hope – but first you have to go through security.

See photos of the installation after the jump. --Jared Jacang Maher

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