Office Art - The People Who Live in the Cubical

Whether or not people realize artistic expression is an essential part of their lives, they often demonstrate it.

Years ago, in another lifetime, I was a Civil Engineer working for a large area firm. Everybody worked in the typical cubical buried under reams of paper, drawings, books, and calculations. For the most part engineer cubicles were all business with nothing interesting about them. But every now and then I’d visit a cubicle that would proudly be displaying a “Masterpiece of Art”.

Usually, the Masterpiece consisted of carefully arranged personal items such as kids’ artwork, found objects, toys, soda cans, seasonal decorations, even a carefully stacked tower of paper. I was fascinated that in a lot of these cubicles was an absolute scramble of “stuff”, yet the Masterpiece would be visibly placed where all can see.

Here are some of my favorites.

1. Tower of Balal; This is a very carefully curated stack of drawings. Similar to a Chihuly curated tower of glass. Notice how random yet well balanced the Tower is.

2. Buried Treasure: A friend of mine was a Geotech Engineer who displayed his treasure of unearthed stones, glass, and oddities.

3. Pencils and Glass: This was my desk. I’ve always collected antiques and glassware. In my “other life” I was an artist.

4. Under the Sea: This colleague’s office was spectacularly in disarray. Yet up on the wall were the renderings of his daughter.

5. Cartoon: Bert and Sponge Bob.