Tools

Donald Lipski: Tools

Wellington E. Webb Municipal Building

201 W. Colfax Avenue, Denver, CO 80202

Permanent installation

Admission: free

Review by Paloma Jimenez

Peeking out behind the government gray walkways of the Wellington E. Webb Municipal Building, you’ll find Donald Lipski’s tool galaxy. The public art installation, simply titled Tools, spans the height of a sixty-foot limestone wall.

A view of the Wellington E. Webb Municipal Building in downtown Denver with Donald Lipski’s Tools on display on the back wall. Image by Paloma Jimenez.

Site-specificity reaches a pinnacle in this piece, as the building houses the offices, departments, and services that run the City and County of Denver. City employees dressed in either business casual or high-visibility construction vests frequently walk past the reconfigured collection of tools, highlighting the vast number of hands and minds required to build Denver.

A detail view of a star made with hand saws in Donald Lipski’s Tools, 2003, found object sculptures in the Denver Public Art Collection. Image by Paloma Jimenez.

A view of a circle made of axes and a circle of office chairs in Donald Lipski’s Tools, 2003, found object sculptures. Image by Paloma Jimenez.

Lipski finds an inherent radial arrangement in each grouping of objects and, as a whole, they resemble an interdependent gear system. Five rusted saws form a star and teal office chairs organize their wayward limbs to create an evolved asterisk.

A view of Donald Lipski’s Tools, 2003, found object sculptures, with a spiral of clipboards in the foreground on the right. Image by Paloma Jimenez.

A detail view of arrangements of mop buckets and work gloves in Donald Lipski’s Tools, 2003, found object sculptures. Image by Paloma Jimenez.

An elegant swirl of clipboards captures the endless flurry of paperwork required to operate a city. Many of the configurations surprise, due to their unlikely geometric symmetry. Even the clumsy metal mop buckets manage to cluster together in a unified shape.

A view of Donald Lipski’s Tools, 2003, found object sculptures, with a circle of security cameras in the center and a circle of traffic cones in the upper right. Image by Paloma Jimenez.

Each floor reveals a new perspective of the conglomerate objects. Towards the top, sun-worn traffic cones provide a satisfying pop of safety orange. Nearby, an ouroboros of security cameras self-surveil and one-way signs point in all directions. The installation often speaks in these material riddles. Lipski’s respect for the sculptural qualities in each individual object turns what could easily become a chaotic game of I-Spy into an unexpectedly mystical taxonomy.

A installation view of Donald Lipski’s Tools, 2003, found object sculptures, in the Wellington E. Webb Municipal Building. Image by Paloma Jimenez.

Lit by a skylight, the celestial arrangement of Tools reveres the ordinary objects that propel civilization forward. Lipski finds the sweet spot between mathematical magic and artistic logic to honor the role of tools and, by extension, workers.

Paloma Jimenez (she/her) is an artist, writer, and teacher. Her work has been exhibited throughout the United States and has been featured in international publications. She received her BA from Vassar College and her MFA from Parsons School of Design.