As part of New York’s vision for a world-class airport at LaGuardia, Terminal B unveiled spectacular new permanent artworks by world-renowned artists, Jeppe Hein, Sabine Hornig, Laura Owens and Sarah Sze. The project is a partnership with the leading New York-based nonprofit Public Art Fund to bring inspirational, large-scale art installations to the new LaGuardia Airport.
Nicholas Baume, Director & Chief Curator of Public Art Fund, said “New Yorkers will soon have a major terminal at LaGuardia Airport that reflects the energy, vitality, and innovation of New York City. Great art and artists are fundamental to New York’s DNA, and we are excited to collaborate with several of the world’s most visionary artists, LaGuardia Gateway Partners and the Port Authority to create a unique new terminal that brilliantly expresses the creative spirit of New York.”
“New York’s airports are the world’s entry points into the United States, and they need to reflect what this state and country are all about,” Governor Andrew Cuomo said. “As we are building a new LaGuardia to meet 21st century travel standards, we are also bringing in the work of renowned artists who capture the unique elements of Queens and New York, giving travelers a true Empire State experience the moment they arrive.”
As part of the $8 billion transformation of LGA, the new Terminal B will replace the existing Terminal B passenger facilities with a new arrivals and departures hall, two new concourses, and 35 new gates, including 18 new gates that are already open.
While the new terminal and concourses will dramatically improve the functionality of the airport, new works of art are intended to enhance dramatically the visual experience for travelers at one of New York’s most important gateways.
Specifically, the partnership with Public Art Fund will enable airport travelers to enjoy ambitious permanent commissions by four of the world’s leading artists. The artists’ installations have been unveiled with the opening of the brand-new Terminal B Arrivals and Departures Hall.
Jeppe Hein: A resident of Berlin, Jeppe Hein creates interactive artworks that lie at the intersection of art, architecture, and technical inventions. Unique in their formal simplicity and frequent use of humor, his works recall traditions of Minimalist sculpture and Conceptual art of the 1970s, and often feature surprising and captivating elements that focus the spectator’s experience on the surrounding space. Hein’s notable previous exhibitions include Please Touch The Art exhibited at Brooklyn Bridge Park in 2015, as well as permanent installations in numerous locations throughout Europe. You might also recognize his work from ART2030, Breath with Me, a global art project exhibited at the United Nations and in Central Park last year.
Jeppe Hein (b. 1974, Copenhagen, Denmark)
All Your Wishes, 2020 (Below)
Installation of 70 Mirror Balloons (PVD coated stainless steel) and 3 Modified Social Benches (powder coated aluminum)
Balloons: each 1’4” h x 11” w x 11” d
Benches: A) 2’6” h x 7’7” w x 4’2” d; B) 5’ 6” h x 17’8” w x 5’4” d; C) 2’9” h x 5’6” w x 1’4” d
Commissioned by LaGuardia Gateway Partners in partnership with Public Art Fund
Sabine Hornig: Berlin based artist Sabine Hornig is known for her sculptures, spatial interventions and transparent photographs that recontextualize familiar places through overlapping perspectives and inversions of scale and dimension. These concepts allow for new interpretations of conventional histories, memory, and the lived environment. Her large-scale architectural artworks, applied directly onto the existing glass facades of buildings, enable the public to simultaneously experience various visions and perspectives at the same time on the transparent medium. Throughout the past two decades, Hornig has realized such installations worldwide as well as exhibited regularly in New York.
Sabine Hornig (b. 1964, Pforzheim, West Germany)
La Guardia Vistas, 2020 (Below)
Latex ink and vinyl mounted on glass
42’ h x 268’ w
Commissioned by LaGuardia Gateway Partners in partnership with Public Art Fund
Laura Owens: Los Angeles based artist Laura Owens has achieved international recognition for her dynamic and experimental paintings. Incorporating diverse references and techniques, her art challenges the nature of painting in bold and often witty ways, while demonstrating an intimate awareness of form, color, and line. Owens’ work has been featured in museums internationally, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Guggenheim Museum, Museum of Modern Art in New York, Tate Modern, Centre Georges Pompidou, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and other prominent institutions across the globe. You might recognize her work from her 2017 exhibition at The Whitney where a comprehensive look at her whimsical work, with over 60 paintings, was on view.
Laura Owens, (b. 1970, Euclid, OH)
I? NY, 2020
Handmade glazed ceramic tiles and grout
67’10” h x 566’3” w x 28’11” d
Sarah Sze: A resident of New York City and professor of visual arts at Columbia University, Sarah Sze’s immersive, large-scale works navigate the proliferation of images, objects, and information that surround us daily by employing complex constellations of myriad materials. A recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship in 2003, Sze has exhibited extensively in museums worldwide and represented the United States at the Venice Biennale in 2013. Sze has been engaged in public commissions throughout her career, most recently “Blueprint for a Landscape,” 2017, which transforms the 96th Street Station of the new Second Avenue Subway Line. You may remember her work at Frieze New York 2019 at Rockefeller Center on the Plaza.
Sarah Sze, (b. 1969, Boston, MA)
Shorter than the Day, 2020
Powder coated aluminum and steel
48’ h x 30’ w x 30’ d
Commissioned by LaGuardia Gateway Partners in partnership with Public Art Fund
Complementing the four permanent commissions, the partnership includes additional temporary artwork installed throughout the facility, providing more artists the opportunity to engage with the new terminal and its visitors. The first of this series was installed in July 2019 in the new eastern concourse, the initial portion of the new Terminal B to debut, and currently features artworks by Chris Bogia and Olaf Breuning.
Chris Bogia: A resident of Queens for more than 15 years, Chris Bogia is a recent alum of the Queens Museum Studio Program (2018) and an instructor of sculpture at New York University. Bogia received his MFA from Yale University, New Haven, CT and his BA from New York University, NY. He was a recent recipient of the Jackson Pollock – Lee Krasner Foundation Grant, a Queens Council for the Arts, New Works Grant, as well as a Rema Hort Mann Foundation Artist Community Engagement Grant. Bogia is also the co-founder and director of Fire Island Artist Residency, the world’s first LGBTQ artist residency. Bogia’s work for Terminal B, entitled Windowsill Watcher (2018), is an abstract sculpture that combines methods drawn from the history of decorative arts, folk craft movements and interior design.
Olaf Breuning: New York based, Swiss artist Olaf Breuning has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Swiss Institute in New York, the Migros Museum in Zurich, the Australian Center of Photography in Sydney, and the Centre d’Art Contemporain in La Chapelle du Genêteil France, among others. Breuning’s works on view in Terminal B, entitled Clouds (2014), and Thumbs Up (2015), evoke improvised signage, theatrical flats and children’s sketches inspired by one of the artist’s own photographs.
This new partnership with LaGuardia Gateway Partners and Public Art Fund is yet another milestone in incorporating art into the historic $8 billion transformation of LaGuardia Airport and a critical sign of progress in the comprehensive LaGuardia Terminal B redevelopment program. This partnership comes just ahead of the start of the Queens Council on the Arts’ third year of its renowned Artport Residency, a collaboration with the Port Authority that enables local artists to utilize LaGuardia Airport Terminal A’s rotunda for creating new works and connecting with passengers.
In addition to the opening of the new Terminal B Arrivals and Departures Hall, a vast majority of major roadway work for the new airport is also set to be complete in mid-2020. A modern arrivals and departures hall at Terminal C will open in 2022 with the phased opening of three additional concourses.
Rick Cotton, Executive Director at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, said,”Building a whole new airport at LaGuardia doesn’t just mean bricks and mortar, though we’re certainly doing that. It also means transforming the experience for travelers with striking artwork that conveys a sense of place – a sense of Queens and of the Empire State. We are delighted that the work of these four prominent artists will serve as focal points inside the new Terminal B Arrivals and Departures Hall. This new partnership will help beautify, engage and inspire travelers coming through LaGuardia’s Terminal B.”
Check out a few fun-facts about Terminal B.