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| Pagoda Pavilion, detail Jonathan Kirk View more images in the slideshow. |
Contact: Sydney Waller, 315-724-8381
Utica, N.Y. - A unique sculpture garden located in an industrial development park in Upstate New York expanded this past summer and fall with the addition of eight more large-scale outdoor works created by professional artists associated with the Sculpture Space international program. Griffiss International Sculpture Garden (GISC) on the grounds of the Griffiss Business and Technology Park in Rome, N.Y. added these works to the nine pieces installed last summer via an alliance with Sculpture Space. According to Sculpture Space Executive Director Sydney Waller, “This kind of venue within a thriving business park complete with an airfield and railroad is thought to be the only one of its kind in the nation”.
Installed on the Sasaki Associates-landscaped 3,500 acres of the Griffiss Business and Technology Park, the sculptures are reflective of the successful collaboration between Sculpture Space, Griffiss Landowners Association and the Griffiss Local Development Corporation of Rome, New York, which began with exploratory conversations in 2006. GLDC works to promote and expand business in Central New York State’s Griffiss Business and Technology Park, a 3,500 acre former U.S. Air Force Base now home to 65 businesses with 5,800 employees.
Among the eight new sculptures installed is a piece that was uniquely supported by the nearby City of Utica. The city donated a 15-foot maple tree from its department of parks and recreation. Sculpture Space alumnus and local established artist James McDermid carved an abstract sculpture from the tree, entitled ‘Wish To Fly’. Polish artist Tomasz Domanski fabricated and assembled his aluminum piece “Chimney” on site during the first half of July, California native Mark Abildgaard assembled his glass columns August 17-21, British-born artists Jenny Polak and Jonathan Kirkassembled their works on site, Polak’s “Lookout Landing” in August and Kirk’s “Pagoda Pavilion” in September.
Among the other works added to the park this year are several which can be categorized as “green” art including ‘Lookout Landing’ by Jenny Polak, that is lit by LED solar-powered lights. Both ‘Lookout Landing’ and Jonathan Kirk’s ‘Pagoda Pavilion’ are also functional in nature and can provide seating to park visitors.
Highlights: The 2009 Artists
| Blue Light Column Mark Abildgaard |
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| Revolving Door Charlie Citron |
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| Chimney Tomasz Domanski |
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| Pagoda Pavilion Jonathan Kirk |
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| Lookout Landing Jenny Polak |
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| Vermont II, Courtesy of Nadine Witkin, Estate of Isaac Witkin |
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| wood sculpture James McDermid |
Californian Mark Abildgaard lives in Woodland, CA and was awarded a Sculpture Space Residency in 1985. His two pieces, Blue Light Column and Amber Light Column, are site-specific works and serve as markers for new walking trails at Griffiss. “I have always been interested in the way glass can interact with light. Early in my career I was drawn into working with cast glass because of the way the solid castings would glow in certain lighting conditions. The way that a piece of cast glass would change in appearance through the course of the day with natural light was intriguing to me.” Each column is made of glass block and stands 10 feet tall with a LED light fixture in the base to illuminate the column at night. The base for each column is a stainless steel box that houses the LED light fixture. The column is sealed by a clear panel on the top. His outdoor piece, Passage, 1985, is part of the Utica College campus art collection.
Charlie Citron lives in Amsterdam, Netherlands was awarded Residencies in 1991,1992, and 1999. Revolving Door, which is on loan for two years, is part of a two-year project when Citron studied and built environments having to do with business and office spaces especially in urban environments. “A revolving door [is] a portal, a point of entry, a transition between public space and private office space, “ the artist stated. In this sense it functioned “as a threshold, a hermetic sculptural object and as a lens which the viewer passes through.” Citron’s Revolving Door 2 is located near the rotary where Route 825 and Ellsworth Road intersect. The piece is on loan for two years.
Tomasz Domanski Born in Gizycko, Poland; lives in Wroclaw, Poland and was a Sculpture Space Artist in Residence in 1998. He traveled to the US to specifically to create Chimney. Tomasz Domanski says that the design of this work is influenced by the distinctly American movement of Minimalism – especially the work of Donald Judd and Robert Morris. In its construction, Chimney combines two worlds: the world of business and industry and the world of creativity. Straight lines, edges, and right angles have been softened in a gently undulating curved design. Moreover, the sculpture has two entirely different visages: one belonging to day, and the other to the night. During the day, the light of the sun reflects off the polished aluminum to produce a brilliant glare, and at night the amber lamp inside that casts its glow in the dark produces a very different effect. The artist hopes he has captured the spirit of collaboration between business and art that the Griffiss Business Park project embodies. Domanski feels that by providing an opportunity for the presentation of contemporary art, Griffiss Business Park is itself a beacon. It is a model of the mutual benefits that industry and the arts can realize in their coexistence.
Jonathan Kirk Born in Saffron Walden, England, Kirk now lives in Utica, New York where he served as Sculpture Space Studio Manager, 1980-2000. Kirk has the distinction of having his work selected for the Griffiss International Sculpture Garden for two consecutive years. About Pagoda Pavilion, he explains that the gazebo design is based on a variety of combined visual references including the Norwegian Stave Church, the Japanese Pagoda, the Western Pavilion, along with “and a bit of humor and whimsy lifted from my own sculptural preoccupations with certain forms and shapes that have appeared in my works over the years.” As the inaugural ‘Griffiss Gazebo’, the structure offers visitors benches that are built into the piece, which falls within a 12‘ diameter footprint.
Jenny Polak- Born in London, England, she now lives in Brooklyn, NY, and was awarded a Sculpture Space Residency in 1995. Polak describes herself as “an artist making architectural installations, drawings and web projects.” She credits her family history of migration for her deep interest in issues of immigration and border politics. When conceiving Lookout Landing, she was inspired by the “legacy and continuing significance of the [Griffiss] air base. [She] searched for an image that could convey an archaeology of flight and a structure that though intended to frame a view, might itself be visible from the air. I was also struck by the satellite view of the negative space between the [Griffiss] ‘nose docks, ’ “Polak stated. “….This trace, and my long-time interest in hidden truths made visible in art, led me towards a structure that references a hidden landing.” Her piece includes a fabric canopy fabricated by a regional sail maker.
Isaac Witkin (the estate) 1936-2006 Born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1936, Witkin enjoyed a Sculpture Space Residency in Utica in 1977. The piece on loan at Griffiss, Vermont II, is unique in a distinguished series. Vermont I, 1965, is owned by the Tate Gallery, London, United Kingdom, acquired circa 1972, Vermont III, Collection British Arts Council; and Vermont IV is in a private collection in Switzerland. Isaac. After graduating from St. Martins School of Art in London in 1960, Witkin apprenticed with sculpture great Henry Moore. In a 1964 show at Whitechapel Gallery, also in London, Witkin and his fellow St. Martin "New Generation" sculptors made their big entry into the English art world. In 1965 his work received a first prize in the Paris Biennale. His piece, "Nagas", was included in the 1966 exhibit, Primary Structures at the Jewish Museum in New York. Described in Witkin’s New York Times obituary as “one of Minimalism’s defining exhibitions,” Witkin represented the British influence on the "New Art" anchored by Anthony Caro. His iconic piece is on loan to Griffiss and is installed adjacent to The Griffiss Institute in technology Heights.
James McDermid- Summer Artist-in-Residence. Though born in Chicago, IL, McDermid now lives in Rome, NY. He was a Resident at Sculpture Space in 1976, 1977, 1979, and 1987 and is wellknown as an established sculptor long associated with the Munson Williams Proctor School of Art. For the Griffiss project, McDermid chose to carve a wood sculpture, on location. His preference was to use a hollow tree log “so that the inner hollow space will be an active part of the design. “ About the location McDermid says, “It seems to me that the history of Griffiss has been about flight and its supportive technology. I would like to carve an abstract sculpture suggestive of flight, using metaphors – aspects of bird, wing, plane, and space. Lines that suggest speed, energy, and force will fracture and create illusions. I want the sculpture to avoid being grandiose by having imagery blend and weave together.”
Highlights from the inaugural year (2008) include:
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| Crown, 2008 Rainer Maria Wehner |
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| Wishing Tree, 2008 Tash Taskale |
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| Garden include Birth of Venus, 2006 Lucia Warck Meister |
Crown, 2008 by Rainer Maria Wehner (b. Munich Germany), constructed of 5 ultramarine blue powder coated square steel tubes fractured randomly in acute angles and arranged as a ‘cloud of zigzags’ 21 feet in the air. Resembling a crown of thorns or giant ferns unfolding, the blue colour was purposely chosen to contradict natural associations. Crown is part of the GISG permanent collection.
Wishing Tree, 2008, by Tash Taskale (b. Ankara, Turkey), is a 25 feet high, galvanized red powder coated steel work that represents the iconic, symbolic forms that humans have created throughout history to help bring them good fortune and protection. It is the third in his series of ‘Wishing Trees’ - others are in Taiwan, and Hartford, Connecticut. His works probe the origins of things by exploring oppositions such as primitive versus industrial. Wishing Tree is part of the GISG permanent collection.
Other works installed in 2008 and that on two or three year loans to the Garden include Birth of Venus, 2006, which consists of 16 translucent cast glass spheres of varying diameters (32”, 24”, and 16”). The Birth of Venus is “about strength and precariousness, the locus of beauty and storm, the source of calm and turmoil,” explains Warck Meister. The unusual scale is a fundamental element of the installation piece Warck Meister intends it to enhance our perception of the environment: “It appears as if it originated from within a body of water…. The translucent spheres sparkle in the light of the sun activating their space and surroundings. Their shine and apparent immateriality confer lightness and an organic quality to the group. As the daylight and the passing weather shift, so will the colors and reflections. The Birth of Venus merges quietly with its site.”
Six further works created between 1975 and 2006 have been lent to the Garden for a period of two years, after which they are available for purchase. The artists are Katarina Isaksson, SS ‘87 (Franklin, NY; b. Sweden); Jonathan Kirk, SS studio manager 1980-1991 (Utica, NY; b. UK); John McCarty, SS ’78, ’79, ‘80 (Delaplane, VA; b. VA); Cestmir Suska, SS ‘99 (Czech Republic); William Tucker, SS ‘79 (Northampton, MA; b. Egypt of British parents); and John von Bergen, SS co-founder and alumnus (Clinton, NY; b. Sweden).
Over the next ten years, planned development of the Garden will expand the scope of the collection.
All of artists participated in Sculpture Space’s international residency program, where they honed their skills. Their work covers a broad spectrum across the world of contemporary sculpture. This year’s sculptors come from England, Poland, the Netherlands and the United States. Their works incorporate a broad range of materials from wood and fabric to glass and metal. For more than 30 years this internationally respected sculpture residency program in Utica, New York, has focused on supporting emerging and mid-career artists via two-month artist residencies. It has served as a place in which more than 400 artists from 24 countries have honed their skills and developed successful careers. Work created at Sculpture Space is exhibited in museums, galleries and parks around the world.
Directions and Map of Griffiss International Sculpture Garden
Sculpture Space GISC staff
Artists Liaison/Installation Coordination 2009- Tina Betz
Artist Liaison/Installation Coordination 2008- Christi Harrington
Curatorial Project Director- Sydney Waller
Admin Support- Jodi Bates, Angela Marken
