In 2009, a celebrity friend of the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh surprisingly donated a 1983 Jeep Grand Wagoneer that didn’t run. Staff from Museum leadership, exhibits, and public programs creatively designed a two-phase project with local artist Keny Marshall. Angela was program manager at the Museum, and coordinated the first phase, “(de)CARstruction” a 6-hour public spectacle where the Wagoneer was disassembled by Marshall’s artist team live outside in a cordoned arena of welding torches, wrenches, and piles of parts. Onlookers cooked s’mores over fire pits among the golden leaves of Buhl Community Park as they watched the noisy action, and guest facilitator “Harry the Saturday Mechanic” roamed the crowd to answer questions with the Wagoneer car manual.

In the second phase, Marshall transformed the disassembled car into an 8′ diameter ball sculpture, with gears, motor housings, and rockers flipped inside-out. Titled “(re)CARstruction,” the unique public art stands today at the corner of Children’s Way and West Commons on Pittsburgh’s North Side. (Photo by Can Pac Swire.)