Date: Fri 03-Sep-1999

Publication: Ant

Author: MARION

Quick Words:

sculpture-Noguchi-Ellsworth

Full Text:

Major Outdoor Sculpture Exhibition At Lincoln Center

(with 3 cuts)

NEW YORK CITY -- An installation of sculpture by Isamu Noguchi, David Smith,

Claes Oldenburg, Ellsworth Kelly and other major artists will be exhibited

outdoors at Lincoln Center Plaza through May, 2000.

The 14 sculptures, most of which are monumental in size, are on loan from the

State of New York Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller Empire State Plaza Art

Collection in Albany, N.Y. The exhibition is installed around the Lincoln

Center North plaza Reflecting Pool located in front of the Vivian Beaumont

Theater and offers unlimited free access to the public.

The outdoor sculpture exhibition from the Empire State Plaza Art Collection

represents the culmination of several years of planning to bring the

sculptures to Lincoln Center Plaza, where the works can be enjoyed by a new

audience of New Yorkers and visitors from around the world. This special

exhibition offers a rare viewing of these sculptures outside of their

permanent space on the Empire State Plaza in Albany, where they were installed

in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

The 14 works, selected by the curatorial staff of the New York State Office of

General Services, are on loan to Lincoln Center as part of the celebration of

the 40th anniversary of the ground breaking of Lincoln Center on May 14, 1959.

"We are delighted by the arrival of these important sculptures which will

complement the outdoor works by Henry Moore and Alexander Calder in our

permanent collection. It is our hope that Lincoln Center continues to

represent an inspired, creative collaboration in which fine art and

architecture work to complement and enrich the performing arts," said Beverly

Sills, chairman of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts.

The exhibition at Lincoln Center presents a varied sampling of key sculptures

from the 1960s and 1970s. Five painted steel sculptures from David Smith's

"Voltri-Bolton Landing Series" (1962-1963) are a highlight of the exhibition.

Smith wryly incorporated the very tools of metal forging such as hooks, tongs,

pincers and mallets (collected at an abandoned factory site at Voltri, Italy)

at his studio in Bolton Landing, N.Y.

Two works from Isamu Noguchi's "Studies for the Sun" (1959-1964) are also a

major focus of the exhibition. The circular sculptures, one in iron, the other

in bronze, are forms which the artist called "the door opening both to life

and to death."

At least three of the sculptures have been exhibited in key venues. "Elmo V"

(1961), a bronze created by Dimitri Hadzi as a competition entry for the

Auschwitz concentration camp memorial, was shown at the Venice Biennale in the

same year. Claes Oldenburg's lighthearted "Geometric Mouse, Variation I"

(1969) is similar to one made in 1969 for the artist's exhibition at the

Museum of Modern Art in New York. The David Smith "Volton XVIII" (1963) was

lent to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. for the opening of the

museum's East Building in 1978.

Several of the works offer dynamic views of movement. George Sugarman's "Trio"

(1969-1971) provides an exuberant dance of changing shapes in bright yellow

painted aluminum. Seymour Lipton creates tension between organic and

mechanistic forms in "The Empty Room" (1964), while Herbert Ferber shows

counterthrusting forms in "Double One on C" (1966).

In a quieter vein, Clement Meadmore's "Turn Out" (1967) refers to the artist's

method of planning sculptures as "forcing geometry" and Ellsworth Kelly's

minimal "Yellow Blue" (1968) emphasizes the material property of flatness.

The sculptures represent a portion of the Empire State Plaza Art Collection,

which was conceived to complement the visionary government complex in Albany.

Purchased by New York between 1966 and 1973, the collection is comprised of 92

works of modern American art, including paintings and sculptures, selected by

a distinguished group of art historians and museum professionals under the

direction of former New York Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller.

The integration of the collection in Empire State Plaza served as a milestone

in the nation's development of modern art for public spaces.

"It is befitting that these sculptures, which were acquired based on the

vision of Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller, are here to celebrate the

anniversary of the ground breaking of Lincoln Center, also supported by the

Rockefellers," noted Nathan Leventhal, president of Lincoln Center for the

Performing Arts.

The Empire State Collection consists of works created in the 1960s and 1970s

by major artists, many who were members of the New York School, encompassing a

variety of movements including Abstract Expressionism, Colorfield, Minimalism

and Pop Art. The New York School created the most innovative and avant-garde

works of the time and was the first American art movement to have a truly

worldwide impact. The collection has been lauded by Irving Sandler as the

"greatest collection of modern art in any public site that is not a museum."

Telephone 212/875-5000.