As an artist myself, I find Rachel Whiteread's call to end the program, frankly, horrible and utterly selfish. Ms. Whiteread had the opportunity to be a recipient of the project and its far-reaching implications to her art career, and more artists need to be afforded the same opportunity for centuries to come.

Censoring art and its manifestation in public is not the answer to dealing with the afterlife of the many art works.

Ms. Whiteread's public sculptures are all over New York City, my hometown, and I've never felt that they should be abolished just because they presented the material aspect of art making.

If anything, the program itself needs to address the issue of material detritus after the project works have to come down. Sustainability and recyclability, can be made requirements of the program. Artists accountability of what happens with the materials can become part of the review process.

Juries and review committees, if applicable, need to be held accountable just as much.

Artists could invent public displays of live plants, or sculptures made out of natural materials, water, ice, dirt, mud. I mean, really, the sky's the limit. Defining the aesthetics and message of that will be the domain of the artists.