TWO South Korean tourists in their 20s, Sang Woo Lee and Saw Yoon Kim, had happened upon the New York Korean War Veterans Memorial at Battery Park in Lower Manhattan: a soldier's silhouette cut from black granite, the monument decorated by the flags of countries that sent troops to Korea in the early 1950s.

“What is the Korean War?” asked one, speaking in English because they were with an international group of classmates studying English at Central Washington University. “I think it's when the United States sent troops to help South Korea,” said the other. They laughed, embarrassed that they couldn't figure it out.

Eventually, they did. It is what is referred to as 6/25 in South Korea because North Korea invaded the south on June 25, 1950. Once that was settled, the group took pictures, checked each other's hair for bird droppings, then went on their way.

Just a typical learning experience at one of New York City's thousands of pieces of public art, which serve to captivate, educate, provoke conversation — and give discerning pigeons a place to roost.

With the exception of that green statute holding up a torch in the middle of New York Harbor, or major temporary exhibitions like the miles and miles of saffron fabric known as “The Gates,” when Christo's art took over Central Park in February 2005, public art is more a temporary distraction for visitors to New York than the object of a visit: a picture snapped while hanging onto the horns of the charging bull near Wall Street or kissing in front of the postage-stamp-famous Love sculpture on the corner of Avenue of the Americas and 55th Street.

But now that spring is here and New York's weather is becoming more inviting, the city's enormous outdoor museum is a match for any of its more famous (and more expensive) indoor ones.

The city's Temporary Public Art Program will have its 40th anniversary in October, and the Parks Department plans to celebrate with an onslaught of temporary exhibitions, from Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens on the East River in Queens to Wave Hill in the Bronx, overlooking the Palisades, with plenty of places between. The roster of exhibitions will be posted on the Parks Department Web site this summer, but for those who can't wait that long or just can't make it to town then, there are, as usual, myriad temporary works on display now.

In the middle of the Ritz-Carlton's plaza, not far from the Korean War memorial, are casts of gnarled, 2,000-year-old olive trees from Italy. They were put there by Creative Time, one of the older purveyors of temporary public art in the city. The Public Art Fund, the biggest player in such projects, sponsored the mostly outdoor “World Is Round” exhibition at the MetroTech Center in Brooklyn and the exhibition of Calders on the lawn at City Hall Park.

Probably the weirdest current temporary installation is in Madison Square Park, where a sound sculpture went live on March 21 and will be available for listening until May 1. At the north end of the park, sounds from high above the street can be heard over the noise from the traffic surrounding the park. The highflying sounds include the revived bells of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company Tower, which had been silent for five years.

Madison Square Park also has several statues of fine pedigree: Saint-Gaudens's depiction of Admiral Farragut (1880) and John Quincy Adams Ward's statue of the 19th-century politician Roscoe Conkling (1893), among others. Conkling stands near the line for burgers and shakes at Danny Meyer's Shake Shack.

In Central Park, several sculptures seem designed to put smiles on children's faces. There's the Delacorte Clock, with its animal musicians (hippo on violin, a penguin drummer, etc.) at the Central Park Zoo (and a nearby bear dancing with tiny frogs). A bit farther north are statues of Mother Goose, Hans Christian Andersen and his ugly duckling, and Balto, the Siberian husky who led the sled team that delivered diphtheria serum to a suffering Nome, Alaska, in 1925. Unlike Andersen, Balto made it to the unveiling ceremony of his statue in Central Park in December 1925 — good dog!

For those who like to ponder and discuss public art, Creative Time has scheduled a free conference on the weekend of May 12 and 13 called “The Situational Drive: Complexities of Public Sphere Engagement.”

There is also an endless array of art in the subway system. And in Harlem, CITYarts puts artists and children together to create murals and sculptures. Check out its colorful, Miró-like “Helio-Chronometer” on the side of Public School 72. And while you're there, within a block there is a fantastic building-size mural called “The Spirit of East Harlem” by Hank Prussing and Manny Vega. In addition, you're not too far from the Graffiti Hall of Fame at 106th and Park, and ... well, you get the idea. Art is everywhere in New York City.

VISITOR INFORMATION

WEB SITES

Department of Parks and Recreation: www.nycgovparks.org, search “public art” or “monuments.”

Public Art Fund: www.publicartfund.org.

Creative Time: www.creativetime.org.

CITYarts: www.cityarts.org.

Metropolitan Transportation Authority's Arts for Transit: www.mta.info/mta/aft/index.html.

Socrates Sculpture Park: www.scoratessculpturepark.org.

Wave Hill: www.wavehill.org.

LOCATIONS

Battery Park is at the southern tip of Manhattan. “Charging Bull” is on Broadway near Morris Street, and “Love” is at Avenue of the Americas and West 55th Street.

Socrates Sculpture Park is at 32-01 Vernon Boulevard, Long Island City, Queens; admission is free. The Wave Hill public gardens and cultural center is at 249th Street and Independence Avenue, Riverdale, the Bronx; admission is $4 but free on Saturday mornings and Tuesdays.

“The World Is Round” runs until Sept. 9 at MetroTech Center on Myrtle Avenue between Jay Street and Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn.

“Alexander Calder in New York,” is on display through fall 2007. City Hall Park at Broadway and Park Row.

At Madison Square Park, between Fifth and Madison Avenues from East 23rd to 26th Streets, “Panoramic Echoes” runs through May 1. “Conjoined,” “Defunct” and “Erratic,” sculptures by Roxy Paine, will be on view May 15 through December.

The Central Park Zoo is near East 64th Street and Fifth Avenue. The Delacorte Clock and other sculptures can be seen without entering the zoo.

“Helio-Chronometer” is at Public School 72, East 104th Street and Lexington Avenue.