Tag Archives: public art

A Tudor-style Skyscraper: Richard Woods at the Lever House

Posted on by

When I wrote about Public Art in Manhattan, I ended writing that it’s often not successful as it becomes more and more part of the landscape. Well, what better way to shake things up than to do a renovation?

The Lever House, above, at 53rd St and Park is doing just that. The Lever House is an important and seminal building that paved the way for the glass box skyscrapers we have today, and today it features an impressive contemporary art collection. The glass street-level room is used to show pieces of contemporary art, such as Damien Hirst or, currently, Tara Donovan. The public courtyard flows into the sidewalks and streets, and offers benches, a fountain, and enormous, white Hello Kitty statues by artist Tom Sachs. Perhaps it shows how jaded I am that I could become blase about this public art, which, on reviewing my sentence, sounds pretty awesome.

The Lever House rotates the art it shows in the ground level room, but in this upcoming year it plans a more serious make-over. This modernist landmark is going to renovated by artist Richard Woods, who is planning to wrap the walls and outdoor columns in…Tudor-style prints. Yes, Tudor, like England in the 1500s. Reportedly they will be “flora and fauna images a la William Morris.” William Morris opposed Victorian opulence and yearned for a return to the days of Merry ol’ England in his work, and Woods will be echoing the move back in time in his approach to the Lever House.

For an example of Wood’s work, the Perry Rubinstein Gallery in Chelsea is showing the image below. On the walls of the Lever House, this will be a dynamic and interesting change to the boxy, clean-lined glass temple.


I hope he doesn’t touch the Hello Kitties!

Public Art Manhattan

Posted on by

When I walk to work in the morning, I pass a big red metal sculpture on the corner of 57th and Madison. Like many pieces of large civic art, I barely notice it. Office buildings in the city include large abstract sculptural works in the same way that they include a public atrium (also known as a tax break).

Just down the street from my office stands the Lever House, at 54th St. and Park. Currently, it is displaying a light installation by Keith Sonner (that replaced a gold chain link fence complex) in it’s street-level glass box of a room. On the ground level, the Lever House also has benches, a fountain, and — wait for it– large Hello Kitties sculptures (by Tom Sachs, I think) in it’s courtyard area. These white, papermache-style figures are huge and solid. Sometimes tourists take photos with the Hello Kitty sculptures. On one hand, it’s fun, but on the other, I’m not sure that it works.

I question how well these public art displays function, and I think it’s a matter of context. Museum settings at least focus one’s attention. In the case of the Lever House, they own some pretty cool pieces (“Virgin Mother” by Damien Hirst, “Bride Fight” by E.V. Day, “The Hulks” by Jeff Koons) and are making them uniquely accessible to the public with no museum fees. Yet next to the skyscrapers of midtown, these large, awe-inspiring designs are subsumed. The street corner leaves them anonymous, and they become just another obstacle on the street for Manhattanites to speed past. Perhaps it’s a testament to Manhattanites’ drive that they can speed past works of art with a single glance.

Here works of art so easily become like the red sculpture (which happens to be by Alexander Calder) that I pass on my way to work: landscape.