How Cambridge’s public art protectors fight graffiti and grime

Picture a work of art. Now imagine it covered in sap, spider webs, bird poop — even graffiti. That’s the reality for hundreds of outdoor pieces across Cambridge, which has the largest public art collection in New England. After each long, messy winter, the city’s conservation team mobilizes to take care of that massive trove. In early June, a four-person posse started their day at Canal Park, not far from the Museum of Science. They were armed with buckets, a ladder, gentle detergents and other tools of the trade. Then they fired up a battery-powered spray washer to douse a 14-foot-tall sculpture with water. “So we’re washing and waxing the Tower of East Cambridge Faces by James Tyler,” Craig Uram said. The sculpture’s 50, life-sized bronze faces are of area residents circa 1986, and he likened the grouping to a time capsule. “You know, of people’s hairstyles and what eyeglasses looked like in the ’80s.” Faces on sculptor James Tyler’s “Tower of East Cambridge Faces” get dried, as part of a routine cleaning by Cambridge Arts conservation technicians. (Robin Lubbock/WBUR) Uram knows this piece well because he’s the city’s director of art conservation. He explained how a dusting of pollen,...