May 16–November 8, 2015
Press preview: Thursday, May 14
RSVP to nicole.rumore [at] fitzandco.com
Storm King Art Center
1 Museum Road
New Windsor, NY 12553
www.stormking.org
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Storm King Art Center presents its 2015 special exhibition, Lynda Benglis: Water Sources, containing large-scale sculptures and fountains installed outdoors, across Storm King’s 500-acre site, and inside its museum building. Also on view for the 2015 season will be a large-scale temporary installation and a body of new, indoor work by artist Luke Stettner, as part of Storm King’s annual Outlooks series. Both exhibitions open May 16 and are on view through November 2015. Storm King opens for the season on April 1, and remains open to visitors until November 29.
Lynda Benglis: Water Sources includes more than ten outdoor sculptures—some recently created and on view for the first time—as well as a selection of sculptural works installed throughout six galleries in the museum building. Many of the outdoor works are fountains—some created in bronze, others in various colors of cast pigmented polyurethane—and several have never before been exhibited publicly. Indoors, the exhibition will include works in bronze and stone made in the early 1990s, soon after Benglis established a residence in the Southwest. These take the idea of landscape—in particular the rock formations of New Mexico—as their conceptual foundation, while the related exterior fountains meditate on the flow of water and the human body, as well as the idea of plenty and abundance.
Otherworldly landscapes, views of peaks and valleys, moss found growing on the underside of a fountain, and visions of clouds resulting from atomic explosions served as inspiration for the three small-scale fountains that will be shown on the Museum Building’s patio. The works on view date from 1974 to today, and range in scale from two and a half feet to 24 feet tall. A newly completed work will be on view for the first time, titled Hill and Clouds (2015). The work glows in the dark and will be featured in Storm King’s periodic moonlit walks. Two other bronze works—Migrating Pedmarks and Cloak-Wave/Pedmarks (1998)—will greet arriving visitors near Storm King’s main entrance. Formed from clay skins, these were cut from large blocks of clay pressed onto underlying plaster and subsequently cast in bronze. The resulting cloaked figures retain the imprints of Benglis’s fingers and call to mind the accounting of a prehistoric event.
Benglis has been represented in Storm King’s permanent collection since 1974 when Nu, a knotted work made that year, was acquired. Lynda Benglis: Water Sources is the first exhibition to concentrate on and bring together a major body of outdoor work created by Benglis.
The exhibition is co-curated by Storm King’s Director and Chief Curator, David R. Collens, and Curator Nora Lawrence. Collens explains, “Lynda Benglis’s work has been an important part of Storm King’s permanent collection for many years and we are delighted to give visitors the opportunity to experience such an ambitious selection of her sculptures. The exhibition is inspired by the artist’s keen interpretation of landscape, and so Storm King is the perfect place for presenting Water Sources.”
Benglis says of working at Storm King Art Center, “I want to be there forever. It’s really a pleasure to be at Storm King—with the billowing grasses—I want to spend more time there. This is the first, and the first major, showing of the fountains as a group, and a nice setting for them.”
Join the conversation on social media by mentioning Storm King Art Center and using the hashtags #StormKing and #LyndaBenglis when posting.
Media contacts:
Taylor Maatman, FITZ & CO: taylor.maatman [at] fitzandco.com / T +1 212 627 1455 x0926
Nicole Rumore, FITZ & CO: nicole.rumore [at] fitzandco.com / T +1 212 627 1455 x0928
