New App Lets You Find Nashville’s Sculptures and Murals By Phone

Lotus, located in Dragon Park, is a sculpture by Michael Allison who intended for it to be a bike rack. Credit: Metropolitan Nashville Art Commission

Nashville has over 200 pieces of art around the city — with that much, most Nashvillians have seen at least a few of the city’s murals and statues. Not everyone knows who created them or why, like with the flower shaped bike rack in Dragon Park or the metal corn growing outside the Farmers’ Market.

So, the Arts Commission is creating a mobile website, which will contain maps for walking and biking tours, history and even interviews with some of the artists.

The executive director of the Metro Nashville Arts Commission, Jennifer Cole, says she hopes tourists use the website but that the true target is Nashville residents.

“We feel strongly that we have this great community, and that sometimes there are things in people’s neighborhoods and communities that they walk right past and sort of don’t know enough about.  We wanted to provide a tool that’s easy and free.”

The mobile website will launch this fall, and will continue to grow as more art pieces are added around the city.

The Nashville Arts Commission has already started beta testing, with some available biking, walking and driving tours.  The biking and walking tours are both general art tours, and the driving tour goes through areas affected by the 2010 flood.