Sheila Pepe (American, b. 1959), Proposal for ‘My Neighbor’s Garden’ in Madison Square Park, 2023. Telephone poles, yard hardware, nylon and cotton string, shoelaces, paradors, rubber bands, plant materials. Dimensions variable. Collection the artist. Courtesy Madison Square Park Conservancy.
Convening groups of novice and advanced crocheters, artist Sheila Pepe will create her first outdoor exhibition commissioned by Madison Square Park Conservancy and opening on June 26. In My Neighbor’s Garden, Pepe upends a traditional American nineteenth-century urban park layout with a twenty-first century temporary installation that brings color, unexpected materials, and optimism outdoors. Pepe, a feminist and queer artist whose elaborate web-like structures summon and critique conventional women’s craft practice, uses crochet to transform contemporary sculpture.
Opening January 2023, Havah…to breathe, air, life Merges Sikander’s Explorations into Sculpture and Video in an Exhibition That Reconsiders Traditional Representations of Power
Significant new works on the theme of justice by artist Shahzia Sikander are featured in a major multimedia exhibition at Madison Square Park. Presented simultaneously in the park and at the adjacent Courthouse of the Appellate Division, First Department of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, the exhibition Havah…to breathe, air, life features two new large-scale sculptures—one within the park that can be transformed through augmented reality and another atop the Courthouse rooftop, the first female figure to adorn one of its ten plinths. Additionally, a recent video animation by Sikander will be on view in the park, visually intertwining the distinct elements. The exhibition is a culmination of Sikander’s exploration of female representation in monuments and marks her first major, site-specific outdoor exhibition in sculptural form. Havah…to breathe, air, lifeis co-commissioned by Madison Square Park Conservancy and Public Art of the University of Houston System (Public Art UHS). The exhibition will be on view in New York from January 17 through June 4, 2023, before traveling to Houston.
As the exhibition opens, we must congratulate the artist on being awarded the Pollock Prize for Creativity. “The Pollock-Krasner Foundation announced it has awarded the Pollock Prize for Creativity to artistShahzia Sikander. The $50,000 award honors Sikander’s exhibition Havah…to breathe, air, life, opening today, January 17, at Madison Square Park and the neighboring Courthouse of the Appellate Division, First Department of the Supreme Court of the State of New York.” (continued at the end of this post).
Opening January 2023, Havah…to breathe, air, life Merges Sikander’s Explorations into Sculpture and Video in an Exhibition That Reconsiders Traditional Representations of Power
Significant new works on the theme of justice by artist Shahzia Sikander are featured in a major multimedia exhibition at Madison Square Park. Presented simultaneously in the park and at the adjacent Courthouse of the Appellate Division, First Department of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, the exhibition Havah…to breathe, air, life features two new large-scale sculptures—one within the park that can be transformed through augmented reality and another atop the Courthouse rooftop, the first female figure to adorn one of its ten plinths. Additionally, a recent video animation by Sikander will be on view in the park, visually intertwining the distinct elements. The exhibition is a culmination of Sikander’s exploration of female representation in monuments and marks her first major, site-specific outdoor exhibition in sculptural form. Havah…to breathe, air, lifeis co-commissioned by Madison Square Park Conservancy and Public Art of the University of Houston System (Public Art UHS). The exhibition will be on view in New York from January 17 through June 4, 2023, before traveling to Houston.
As the exhibition opens, we must congratulate the artist on being awarded the Pollock Prize for Creativity. The Pollock-Krasner Foundation announced it has awarded the Pollock Prize for Creativity to artistShahzia Sikander. The $50,000 award honors Sikander’s exhibitionHavah…to breathe, air, life, opening today, January 17, at Madison Square Park and the neighboring Courthouse of the Appellate Division, First Department of the Supreme Court of the State of New York.
Landscape and memory Installation 1; ‘Landscape and Memory’ (2022) installation in progress in Madison Square Park with Cristina Iglesias. Photo credit: Lynda Churilla
Spanish artist Cristina Iglesias invites the public to consider the forgotten terrains and geographic history of New York City in a new public art installation opening this June, her first major temporary public art project in the United States. Landscape and Memory places five bronze sculptural pools, flowing with water, into Madison Square Park’s Oval Lawn, harkening back to when the Cedar Creek coursed across the land where the park stands today. Building on Iglesias’ practice of unearthing the forgotten and excavating natural history, Landscape and Memory resurfaces in the imaginations of contemporary viewers the now-invisible force of this ancient waterway.
On view from June 1 through December 4, 2022, Landscape and Memory will be complemented by a slate of interdisciplinary public programs, free and open to the public. Presented within and responding to the work, these include a summer music series curated with Carnegie Hall as well as performance programming organized in conjunction with The Kitchen. Cristina Iglesias will also serve as the keynote speaker for the Conservancy’s annual public art symposium, held this year on Friday, June 3, which will investigate the role of public art in shedding new light on buried histories, both metaphorically and physically.
Hugh Hayden: Brier Patch in Madison Square Park. Image via NYC Parks Department
Surrealist sculptor Hugh Hayden subverts the classroom in a new commission for Madison Square Park entitled ‘Brier Patch‘. The installation will span across four separate lawns and feature a total of one-hundred wooden elementary school-style desks.
Image via Maya Lin Studio, image gallery, Madison Square Park Conservancy
At a time when New Yorkers are cherishing outdoor space ~ from pocket-parks to Central Park, the Madison Square Park Conservancy is preparing to unveil a much anticipated (and delayed) commissioned work by sculptor artist/environmental activist, Maya Lin, with her thoughtful and relevant installations entitled Ghost Forest.
Abigail DeVille, Light of Freedom. Photo credit: Andy Romer Photography
For Madison Square Park Conservancy’s public art commissioning program, artist Abigail DeVille has installed Light of Freedom, a new work that reflects the despair and exultation of this turbulent period. The project is a thirteen-foot high reference to the Statue of Liberty’s torch, and to the scaffolding that encased it during construction. DeVille has filled her torch with a well-worn bell, a herald of freedom, and the arms of mannequins, beseeching viewers.
In addition, join Madison Sq Park + Art21 for a short film to be shown online on Tuesday, January 19, 2021 at 11:00am ~ Register Here (short clip below).
Leonardo Drew: City in the Grass in Madison Square Park
Marking the Madison Square Park Conservancy’s 38th commissioned exhibition, New York-based artist Leonard Drew is creating a monumental new public art project for the Park entitled City in the Grass. The installation will present a topographical view of an abstract cityscape atop a patterned panorama.
New York State Appellate Division of the Supreme Court located at 27 Madison Avenue, NYC
On a cold winter night a few years ago, we arrived early to an art installation opening at the Flatiron/23rd Street Partnership Triangle, and looking for a place to warm up, a volunteer asked if we had ever seen the interior of the Appellate Division Courthouse, just on the other side of Madison Square Park. It was a delightful surprise.
Madison Square Park will be kicking off its Fall season with the new art installation entitled Full Steam Ahead by artist Arlene Shechet. This installation will consist of a series of sculptures in porcelain, wood, and cast iron installed around and within the emptied circular reflecting pool in the north end of Madison Square Park.
What’s This? Five new bee hives in Madison Square Park
Madison Square Park is now home to five new Bee Hives! The newest members of the Madison Square Park garden don’t yet appear on the website, and most park-goers aren’t yet aware of their presence. But if you look closely along the east and west sides of the park, you will find the open-faced wooden structures. We were fortunate to get a tour of each of the hives by park employee, Marvin Burgos.
