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Diego Miro-Rivera ACCX Phase 1 Final Design Arts, Culture, Music and Entertainment Art in Public Places | June 1, 2026 Austin Convention Center Redevelopment (Phase 1) Project Phase Designing (Final) Artist(s) Name Diego Miró-Rivera Art Commission $240,000 Design/ Oversight Funding Type HOT Sponsor Dept Austin Convention Center Managing Dept Council District CDS 9 Downtown Austin, 500 E. Cesar Chavez St, Austin, TX 78701 2 Project Overview Project Overview: • Create a site-specific, architecturally integrated artwork that enhances the visitor experience at the Convention Center. Project Goals: • will reflect the culture, creativity, and vibe that create our shared experience of Austin; • integrate seamlessly into the site, facility, building, finishes and/or infrastructure; • convey the mission of the ACC to promote Austin as a premier destination; • employ sustainable materials and processes in the creation of the artwork; • be easily maintained and vandal resistant in its environment; and • contribute to the depth/breadth of the City of Austin’s public art collection. Timeline: • Final Design Review: June 2026 • Fabrication: July 2026 • Installation: July 2027 3 Cornerstone (Working Title) Location: Site A: South-East corner along Cesar Chavez & Waterloo Greenway Considerations: The artwork is at the conjunction of Cesar Chavez downtown avenue, a park system (Waterloo Greenway), the Convention Center exhibition halls, the historic Trask House, and two other artworks. All these elements have been considered. 4 Past Work • Representing nature as is, life-size, true form • Collecting, composition and display • social and site-specific sculpture 5 Footprint Prints 6 Community Engagement CREWS 7 Community Engagement COHORTS 8 Community Engagement COLLABORATORS 9 Community Engagement COMMUNITY 10 Final Design: Inspiration Theme: What are the foundational natural elements of our city? PEOPLE WATER LIMESTONE 11 CONCEPT: making the invisible, visible 12 Last meeting… Barton Springs Concept… 13 Guiding Conceptual Question: What is the symbolic Cornerstone of the City of Austin? The heart of this installation is an exploration of the essential, yet often invisible, physical systems that sustain a city. Just as the Edwards Aquifer is the silent, subterranean structure that sustains Austin’s ecology, many of the people sustaining civic life and infrastructure are working behind the scenes. This artwork, Cornerstone, seeks to bridge the geological, the social, and the architectural using the city’s foundational stone to portray the urban ecosystem that resulted in this site being the way it is. 14 Final Design: Materials LIMESTONE • The only material used in this artwork is Leuders Limestone supplied by Continental Cut Stone in Florence, Texas. Utilizing cutting edge CNC technology to cut a variety of depths, cuts, and textures to create an architecturally integrated sculptural relief. • Lueders limestone is used in various civic projects and has been a reliable building material in the Austin area for the last 30-40 year. 15 Final Design: Materials Lueders Limestone (Roughback) TBD 16 Final Design: Materials • Lueders Limestone (Roughback) creates patchwork patterning due to inability to control stone coloration & placement. • Lueders Splitface and Cordova Creme Limestone (Cut). Offers consistent coloration and fabrication control. 17 Final Design: Content PEOPLE a variety of individuals and unique expressions, united 18 Final Design: Content How can we give credit to people for their contributions to the making of this site? 19 Final Design: Content The Subjects: 1,000 life-size portraits of the individuals who keep the City and the Convention Center running. This includes but is not limited to, construction workers, custodial staff, maintenance crews, and other municipal /hotel workers— carved directly into the stone. For example: who was on that D-wall excavation crew? 20 Final Design: Process Intro/Seating/Scan prompt ex: Imagine your happy place. 21 Final Design: Process Our 3D face scanning & rendering method maintains key details while still reducing machine time, which is a primary cost driver. 22 Final Design: Visuals Faces will feature a variety of expressions making them feel lively, and inlaid in stone to give the impression of emerging from water. 23 Final Design: Visuals Each block is carved out of Leuders limestone: • 12 x 12 inch standard block • 5-6 inch thick • 1.5-2 inch relief depth Budget allows for up to 1,000 unique individuals 24 Final Design: Visuals Texture Palette: 1. CNC Carved Lueders (Artist Choice): 1,000 unique 1x1ft blocks with lifesize faces with 3" relief depth. Carving other than face may be included. 2. Roughback (1’x4’ vertical stack bond): Standardized finish to integrate with the building’s broader language. (Architect’s choice) 3. Lueders Splitface: Horizontal texture (max 4’’- 6”height) 4. ‘Feathered’ Accents: Hand-finished textures using a pneumatic needler/pitch method to soften the transition between CNC precision and roughback Roughback Splitface CNC 25 WATER Real data about what is really going on down there Lovelady well in South Austin 26 Composition Reference: Incorporating Real Data USGS provides real time data about the levels of the aquifer. Data collected from the Lovelady well in South Austin is a considered a good representation of the overall state of the Edwards Aquifer beneath Austin. https://waterdata.usgs.gov/monitoring-location/USGS-301237097464801/#dataTypeId=measurements-72019-0&period=P1Y 27 Final Design: Site Plan 37.5 ft The scale of this work is comparable to the scale at which the aquifer fluctuates, providing an exciting opportunity to visualize groundwater with limestone (what its made of) in relation to the human scale. 28 Final Design: Site Plan Composition: Lovelady Well sata 1949-present Vertical roughback layers, all on 1ft wide grid 29 Final Design: Composition Faces sequenced based on birthyear or age in correspondence to the year on the graph 30 Conservation & Maintenance Considerations Strategic placement of elements ensures longevity of the carvings and public safety: ▪ Vertical Clearance: minimal carved elements bellow 4ft-6ft to prevent accidental damage, or vandalism at the pedestrian level. ▪ Environmental Protection: Stone is situated under a roof structure which eliminates direct rain exposure. The stone staying dry protects from the presence of mildew which would affect coloration of the stone. ▪ Anti-Graffiti coating will be applied to the entire volume. ▪ Physical Buffers: ▪ South Face/Streetside: The wall is separated from the sidewalk by an 11ft garden bed ▪ East Face/Stairway: Carvings are kept at an average of 4.5ft from the staircase handrails, buffered by landscaping as well to prevent touching. 31 Lighting Design Considerations Shadow will be the pigment. Both Natural and Artificial lighting are crucial for the success of this work. I have been conducting some light studies with the samples and digital mapping tools. Lighting design will be detailed in coordination with project lighting design contractor. 32 Final Design: Fabrication & Installation Fabrication • Masonry installation must begin by July 2027 to align with the overall construction schedule. • General contractor’s stone fabricator, Continental Cut Stone, requested a 54-week fabrication period to CNC all 1,000 faces. • Fabrication will begin with sampling in June and an initial batch of 200 faces in July 2026. • Artist lead community outreach to provide 200 face scans monthly (July–October 2026) for fabrication. Engineering • AIPP is coordinating with ACCD’s architects and sub engineer to finalize anchoring system details, with engineering drawings anticipated by August 2026. Installation • Stone delivery to site is anticipated by July 14, 2027. • Installation will be completed by the project’s masonry contractor, with artist oversight alongside AIPP and LMN/Page teams. TBD 33 Artwork Budget Note: The production budget is being directly managed by AIPP in collaboration with ACCD project teams. The artist is solely responsible for managing their $240K design / oversight budget. 34 Next Steps Timeline: • Final Design • AIPP Panel • Arts Commission • Fabrication Start July 1, 2026 – July 1, 2027 • Installation Start July 14, 2027 – TBD June 2026 June 1, 2026 June 15, 2026 Action needed: A motion to approve the final design for the Austin Convention Center Redevelopment Phase 1 by Diego Miro-Rivera Art in Public Places Project to the Arts Commission. 35