Amateur pick-up games of basketball are a part of the DNA of summer. And with the recent rise in popularity of the WNBA as well as New England’s excitement about the Boston Celtics 2024 NBA Championship win, the timing is apropos to discuss Providence College Art Galleries’ initiative over the past five years to enrich basketball courts in Providence with world-class art.
Jamilee Lacy, recently appointed as the director of the Frye Art Museum, Seattle, Washington, began developing this program while serving as director and chief curator at Providence College Art Galleries. The idea for art-infused basketball courts actualized in 2018. Quite soon into the process the project became My HomeCourt (MHC). Lacy alternated the duties of selecting artists for this initiative between herself and Providence College Art Galleries curator, Kate McNamara.
The program was designed to function jointly with the Providence Parks Department and focuses on one artist chosen yearly to re-surface one court. There are five completed courts visible today. The development of the 2025 iteration, designed by Trenton Doyle Hancock for James Ahern Park, is underway.
Imagine a mural aesthetic slapped to the ground because that’s the visual experience of seeing the courts in situ, their narratives unfolding underfoot, nuancing basketball games as they are being played.