Wednesday, October 4, 2017

Ai Weiwei installation work underway at Cooper Union, Washington Square Park


[Photo by EVG reader Ronnie]

In recent days Ai Weiwei's two-dimensional banners arrived on parts of Cooper Square and the Bowery... ahead of Weiwei's citywide installations titled "Good Fences Make Good Neighbors" that debuts on Oct. 12 (and on view through Feb. 11, 2018)...


[Photo by EVG reader Ronnie]

Around here, installations (called "site-specific interventions") will be on view at 48 E. Seventh St., 189 Chrystie St., 248 Bowery, Cooper Union and the Essex Street Market. (Read more about all this here.)

According to The New York Times, "Good Fences Make Good Neighbors" is "a reflection on the growing hostility toward immigrants and the rise of nationalism throughout the world."

Work continues on the installation at the Cooper Union Foundation Building ...



The work here is titled "Five Fences," and "will fill the open arched spaces on the north portico façade of the building, simultaneously covering these open spaces but remaining porous," according to the description at the Open Art Fund.



EVG reader Ronnie also sent along a shot of work at the arch in Washington Square Park...



As the Washington Square Park Blog first reported, some members of the Washington Square Association are upset about the placement of the installation in the arch. Community members contend that the installation will compromise the arch’s own artistic integrity and disrupt the annual holiday tree lighting, a tradition since 1924.

In the end, Community Board 2 reportedly voted last month in favor of erecting Weiwei's work under the arch. The Park's holiday tree will be moved closer to the fountain for this year.

The installation was commissioned by the Public Art Fund in celebration of its 40th anniversary.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Really? Is that what passes for art these days? Leonardo is tossing his cookies in his tomb.

Anonymous said...

Ah, so that's an artwork going up on Cooper Union. Was thinking it was some random ongoing maintenance.

Anonymous said...

And yet artists can't figure out why no one likes them? "But we do so much for you!" Such as ... being mouthpieces and toadies for oligarchs? If you're all so concerned about your one tiny little footprint in the mud being gentrified, Hollywoodified and corporatized just imagine what a heaven on earth it'll be when the whole world is a massive corporate slum. Yeah, but at least we'll have endless seasons of Game of Thrones and Taylor Swift clones, so we got that going for us.

Anonymous said...

When did art become having an idea that other people actually have to install?

JQ LLC said...

I Weewee is a joke. Look at this "performance" piece.

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2016/feb/01/ai-weiwei-poses-as-drowned-syrian-infant-refugee-in-haunting-photo

The mayor dropped this art exhibit with the same execution, brazenness and lack of subtlety that he drops homeless shelters on unexpected communities and neighborhoods in the 5 boroughs. This installation is being forced on a public that didn't ask for it and on communities that didn't have a chance to weigh it out, not very neighborly at all.

Really, 4 months of this shit. Guarantee they will be vandalized, and they will eventually be guarded by the NYPD with orders from the corrupt mayor.