ACFNY SUPPORTED | MAD.SQ.ART: ERWIN REDL – WHITEOUT
Whiteout, a newly commissioned public art project by artist Erwin Redl (Austrian, b. 1963, lives and works in Ohio and New York City) is comprised of hundreds of transparent white spheres, each embedded with a discrete, white LED light and suspended from a square grid of steel poles and cabling. The orbs will be opportunistic, gently swaying with the wind currents from their positions of two feet above the ground plane. The white LEDs are animated in large-scale patterns superimposing a virtual movement on top of the kinetic movement of the spheres. The sequence of light will be an incandescent treatment of urban public space across the dark seasons of the late fall and winter.
Whiteout will be the thirty-fifth outdoor exhibition organized by Madison Square Park Conservancy. The project is organized by Brooke Kamin Rapaport, Director and Martin Friedman Senior Curator, Mad. Sq. Art, Julia Friedman, Curatorial Manager, and Tom Reidy, Senior Project Manager.
Madison Square Park’s 6.2-acre site welcomes more than 60,000 daily visitors—a richly diverse audience including local residents, families, public school groups and day camps, office workers, students, artists, and international visitors.
ABOUT MAD.SQ.ART AND MADISON SQUARE PARK CONSERVANCY:
Mad. Sq. Art is the free, contemporary art program of Madison Square Park Conservancy. Since 2004, Mad. Sq. Art has commissioned and presented thirty-four premier installations in Madison Square Park by acclaimed artists ranging in practice and media.
Madison Square Park Conservancy is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to protect, nurture, and enhance Madison Square Park, a dynamic seven-acre public green space, creating an environment that fosters moments of inspiration. The Conservancy is committed to engaging the community through its beautiful gardens, inviting amenities, and world-class programming. Madison Square Park Conservancy is licensed by the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation to manage Madison Square Park and is responsible for raising 100% of the funds necessary to operate the Park, including the brilliant horticulture, park maintenance, sanitation, security, and free cultural programs for Park visitors of all ages.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Erwin Redl is best known for creating spectacular light projects on the facades of buildings. He has studied the work of artists in the Southern California Light and Space movement of the late 1960s including Larry Bell, Robert Irwin, James Turrell, and Doug Wheeler, but his materials diverge from their art. His interest is in “tiny sequencing of lights,” he said in a 2014 interview. “…I see myself much more in a…land art context than an artificial, strictly technological context,” Redl explained. He cites the Minimalist conceptual artist Fred Sandback, whose yarn drawings in space Redl first saw in 1997, as an inspiration.
VENUE
Madison Square Park
11 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10010