Jim Walker

What the heck is Big Car Collaborative, anyway? Founder Jim Walker thinks the more important question is, what has Big Car done?

Suggestions from last year’s users include outdoor movies, putting dance steps on the bricks, basketball, and pony rides.

“When there’s a big event, like a concert, people come at 6 and they leave at 8. This kind of stuff—the chairs and tables—aren’t ever over. There weren’t hours on that.”

Local experimental-art collective Know No Stranger lampooned Silicon Valley product launches. The pitch: a robot, Ascme, that only responded to “the crispy rhythm of monosyllabic speech.”

When the events conclude in October, the city will consider permanent changes based on Spark’s success.

“Evening with the Stars brings together the best ballet dancers in the world that we would never have a chance to see here,” says Travis DiNicola of Indy Reads. “It’s the must-see event of the year.”

“We were thinking about a natural progression from last year’s theme (“Mix it Up”), and what we really want people to do is get outside of their comfort zone.”

Whether it’s transforming a barbed-wire fence into a web of lace or flooding the sidewalks with soundscapes, Ed Woodham’s Art in Odd Places (AiOP) project has freaked out Manhattan for nearly a decade now—and it hits Indy this month.