Public art is a specialist field of contemporary art; it has grown considerably since it began in the late 1960s. The term has a wide range of uses, embracing artworks such as sculptures, mosaics, and murals for public places; the design of street furniture; the integration of arts and crafts skills in the design of public spaces and buildings; and the intervention of artists in public debate and socially challenging situations. Its use is specific to the industrialized world and only since the 1980s in Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. Its history is largely connected to urban rather than rural public spaces and issues.

The antecedents of public art include nineteenth-century statues and monumental sculpture, twentieth-century public works and community arts projects, late twentieth-century sculpture parks, ...