Millard Fillmore Malin’s “Founders of Pioneer Industry,” representing the productiveness of the Salt Lake Valley and created in the 1930s is now surrounded by 21st century. high rises.

Sugar House has been arguing about itself for more than a decade. What kind of neighborhood should it be? How tall should its buildings get? What belongs next to the park? The arguments go back more than a decade, to when developer Craig Mecham tore down the old retail spaces on the southwest corner of 1100 East and 2100 South and left a gaping hole in the neighborhood’s fabric. Ever since, members of the community have watched carefully and spoken up loudly. A proposed 305-foot tower at the old Wells Fargo site drew fierce pushback, got revised down, and was still rejected by the Planning Commission. A seven-story hotel on the northwest corner of Sugar House Park—vacant since there Sizzler closed there years ago—was unanimously turned down by the City Council just last month.

The Monument Plaza has been one of the less controversial decisions. When, in 2015, the city closed off what had been a turn lane and a strip of business parking  separating the plaza from the rest of the block, converting it into nearly an acre of public open space, the idea was solid enough that it didn’t generate much of a fight. Of course there should be a gathering place at the center of a densifying neighborhood. The question has been whether it would actually become one. The answer, in the years since, has been: sometimes, partially.

The plaza isn’t without its cultural neighbors. Rockwood Studios, which looks out onto the space and was saved from the high rise development around it because of its location above an underground stream, anchors a monthly Sugar House Art Walk that brings galleries and artists into the neighborhood’s commercial orbit. For several years, Kristina Lenzi had a studio there—which means that when the 12th annual Salt Lake City Performance Art Festival arrives at the plaza this spring, it will be coming home in more ways than one.

Kristina Lenzi performing at the Salt Lake City Library.

Lenzi founded the festival in 2013 after returning from Boston’s international performance art scene and finding Utah’s wanting. The venue came almost by accident: a friend suggested she talk to Paul Reynolds, who ran arts programming at the Salt Lake City Library, and the library turned out to be nearly perfect. Five floors, a broad atrium, nooks and crannies, and a built-in, ever-changing public. As Lenzi later recalled, “The performances capture both unsuspecting passerby as well as viewers who know about the festival. I loved witnessing passersby who stopped to watch the performances and really got into it.”

That home lasted a decade. Then, without warning, the library announced it could no longer host the festival—taking with it not just a venue but a principal financial sponsor. For the 11th festival, in 2024, Lenzi landed at City Academy, a charter school a few blocks away: smaller, less magnificent, but still downtown, still committed to the form. What it lacked was the accidental audience. Without passersby, the nature of the performances would change, and a smaller crowd meant shakier long-term funding.

The plaza had actually been on Lenzi’s radar for a while. “Lisa De France and I thought having PAF in the Plaza was a good idea a couple of years ago,” she says. “There are lots of passersby and that is what I have missed about the library days.” Now, in its 12th year, the festival is operating lean. “This festival is operating on small donations mostly for marketing purposes. Artists will not be paid this time,” Lenzi says. It’s a disappointment, but also an indication of what the festival means to artists. “It’s great that so many artists were willing to come perform in PAF on their own dimes,” Lenzi says. A plaza still working out what it wants to be, surrounded by a neighborhood still arguing about the same question, may be exactly the right place for that kind of commitment to show up.

Sugar House Monument Plaza on a quiet morning — the kind of emptiness the 12th annual Salt Lake City Performance Art Festival hopes to fill.

Salt Lake City Performance Art Festival, Monument Plaza, Salt Lake City, May 8-9.

15 Bytes

UTAH’S ART MAGAZINE SINCE 2001, 15 Bytes is published by Artists of Utah, a 501 (c) 3 non-profit organization headquartered in Salt Lake City, Utah.