MM and GG belong to the Curator’s Council at Storm King and one of the benefits is a private tour of the exhibitions with a Curator for ten guests. MM had picked the perfect day, not all the fall leaves were down, and the temperatures were around 55. It was a little warm in the sun, and then cool in the shade. My outfit of Patagucci Nanopuff vest and jacket was constantly zipped, unzipped, taken off and then put back on again!
Traffic was beastly on the roads, to the Park, and I was wondering if their might be some kind of local event going on. Some people had even opened their lawns for parking! I was going to ask what was going on, but figured we would soon find out what the hold up was.
Although Steve and I have lived in the area for over 37 years, we have never been to StormKingArtcenter.org It is comprised of almost 500 acres interspersed with large pieces of sculpture. It was always in the back of my mind to visit, but never really reached the top of the “I must do this!” list.
Here is a picture of our group looking at a piece by Mark Di Suvero. You can hear the New York State Thruway in the distance. Much of the land was mined for the construction of the thruway. What is left has been sculpted by landscape architects into rolling hills with plantings of grasses and trees. It was really gorgeous.
Here is a collection of pieces by David Smith. He had a farm in Bolton Landing that I got to tour when I went on the Bolton Landing Historical Tour. On that tour the docents were going on and on about the famous David Smith, and his collection that was at Storm King. The farm had a hodge podge of metal sculptures all over the ground. The exhibit at Storm King was much more visually appealing. I tried to look through my old photos, to show you what the farm looked like. I must have deleted them as they were so ugly!
This piece was from Ursula Von Rydingsvard. It was made of cedar and bronze, and I could almost smell the wood through my clogged sinuses. This was Steve’s favorite piece. I thought it looked like an elephant. You can see the pencil markings to show where the pieces were to line up during construction on site!
Here is a picture of our group sitting on Momo Taru by Isamu Noguchi. The granite is from Japan, where the piece was created. Can you imagine how difficult this must have been to ship? Momo Taru was touchable, and in fact you were encouraged to do so. Many of the guests climb into the peach pit, where it is supposed to have “special aural resonance”. You didn’t think I knew that by myself did you? Any way, we didn’t know that and didn’t all climb into sing. In fact none of us climbed in. I really liked feeling the different pieces of granite, some parts were smooth, some rough.
This next piece, Free Ride Home by Kenneth Snelson was my favorite. Our docent explained that in some of the workshops, people are encouraged to replicate it. The workshops use coffee drink stirrers and rubber bands. I think that plastic straws and rubber bands would work equally well. This was a don’t touch exhibit. One of the group, not me(!) touched it and I jumped right in to tsk tsk him!
The Pietrarubbia Group was created by Arnaldo Pomodoro. It was made of bronze, steel, fiberglass and marble. It was also visitor friendly. and the guys had fun opening the sculpture. It was touch friendly and could be opened or closed like a book!
Our last piece to observe was by Louise Nevelson, City on the High Mountain. I thought the placement of the piece was perfect. It was right in front of the visitor center and I thought the lines of the roof and the colors really matched the piece well. Here you can see Steve telling CB about how big the fish are that he catches. MM is shaking her head in disgust. “Are those boys talking about fishing again?”
Afterwards we were off to dinner. No pictures of that. With ten people I would have busted my blog with all the food pictures!
