Common Ground
A shared vocabulary, pressed into the path.
Common Ground is public art series that uses a modular sidewalk collage system that stamps community-authored words, imagery, and symbols permanently into concrete — turning everyday paths into a moment of delight and a reflection on democracy, public voice, and shared space.
Industry & Client
Government Non-Profit Real Estate
Location
Tests in Massachusetts and Maryland
Materials
Pressed concrete, aluminum, steel, fabricated stamps
Services
Public art Community Storytelling
THE IDEA
Sidewalks are among the most democratic spaces in American life: free, public, and encountered through daily routines.
Common Ground is a public art concept that places community-authored collage directly underfoot - embedded into the sidewalk itself. Using a reusable modular matrix, interchangeable word and image elements can be set and rearranged, creating a custom composition that is pressed into fresh concrete, leaving a pressing permanently in the path.
The artwork meets people where they already are - on the way to school, to work, to the park, becoming a part of their everyday.
"The ephemera of our lives - the important fleeting words, quick moments of respite, the objects to which we share tender affections - documented, celebrated, and rediscovered underfoot for years to come."
HOW IT WORKS
01
Community Sourcing
Words, phrases, symbols, and imagery are gathered through community engagement - listening sessions, workshops, site-based conversations, and research. Multilingual content is welcomed.
02
Stamp Library
Sourced content is translated and fabricated into a reusable library of interchangeable stamp elements - words, icons, and small graphic forms that can be composed in many arrangements.
03
Composition
Elements are arranged on a pegboard-style matrix. Compositions may be artist-designed, community-composed, or shaped through a hybrid process - depending on the project.
04
Installation
The matrix is pressed into fresh concrete - ADA-safe, durable, and coordinated with sidewalk repair or targeted pours. The stamp is cleaned and reused at the next site.
A Shared Vocabulary
A shared vocabulary of words and images - endlessly recomposable
At the core of Common Ground is a shared vocabulary: a library of words, phrases, symbols, and imagery sourced from a specific community, translated into physical stamp elements, and held in common. It's the accumulated language a community builds together. Much like a refrigerator magnet poetry, Common Ground plays with the idea of how a shared language can be arranged and rearranged into countless expressions.
A Framework Tailored To Each Community
Common Ground works using an adaptable framework - a technical and community engagement system that different partners can use in different ways. The same infrastructure can support radically different approaches depending on the community, the partner, and the ambition of the project.
One-Time Pilot
A single engagement, a single installation
Community sourcing, composition, and installation happen within a single project timeline. The stamp library is built, used, and archived - ready to be reactivated.
Living Installation
New combinations, year after year
In year one, a community builds its vocabulary. In subsequent years, a local poet, collage artist, or community group uses that vocabulary to compose something new - the stamps rearranged, the sidewalk re-read.
Organizational Partnership
Collaborating with and then handing off to a community steward
A neighborhood organization, BID, or cultural institution takes ownership of the stamp library and manages ongoing iterations - adding new elements, commissioning new compositions, building the vocabulary over time.
Growing Vocabulary
A few new stamps every year
The library of stamps expands incrementally - new words, new symbols, new voices added to the commons each year. The sidewalk becomes a record of a community's evolving language.
These are starting points
The right approach depends on the place, the people, and the resources available. The constant is the underlying system: a shared physical vocabulary, a reusable stamping matrix, and a method for pressing community authorship permanently into public space.
Builds on
Over thirty sidewalk stampings across New England and the Mid-Atlantic.
Common Ground extends the Sidewalk Tattoos series (2021–2025), in which Alexander Golob developed a custom fabricated stamping technique to imprint large-scale imagery and complex text into fresh concrete while maintaining ADA compliance and long-term durability. This next iteration replaces a single fixed stamp with a flexible, recomposable system — capable of adapting to different communities, sites, and authorship models.
The Technique
Sidewalk stamping as a medium was first developed by artist Marcus Young in St. Paul in 2008, using simple sans-serif text. In Sidewalk Tattoos, Golob expanded the technique to accommodate large-format imagery and complex letterforms — and, as far as is known, became the first artist to do so while maintaining ADA-safe relief. Common Ground is the next evolution: a modular, community-authored system.
No Noted Impact on Sidewalk Longevity
To develop this process, Alexander conducted a nation-wide survey of communities that have done sidewalk poetry. Communities ranged from those in the warm weather of Florida and California to the winter cold of Massachusetts and Missouri. Many of these communities have sidewalk poetry that is over a decade old. In each case, they identified no discernable difference in longevity of sidewalks between those with stamped poetry and those without stamped poetry.
Commission & Collaborate
Common Ground is available for commission.
The project is well-suited to municipalities, business improvement districts, cultural institutions, and parks departments looking to integrate community voice into permanent civic infrastructure. It can be scaled from a single sidewalk panel to a multi-site corridor installation, and can be coordinated with existing sidewalk repair or construction schedules.
Alexander Golob brings over a decade of public art experience, a proven fabrication method, and an established process for community engagement across diverse neighborhoods and populations.
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