Michael Elmgreen and Ingar Dragset |The Hive, at the  Moynihan Train Hall

Public Art Fund was invited by Empire State Development to develop and direct a program of ambitious art installations for three prominent sites within the Train Hall. In keeping with the redesigned building’s architectural integration of old and new, the art program commissioned three of the world’s leading artists to create large-scale, site-specific artworks that reflect broadly on notions of past, present, and future. These very different commissions, by Stan Douglas, Elmgreen & Dragset, and Kehinde Wiley, demonstrate each artist’s ingenuity and vision for these permanent installations.

The first piece that greets you as you enter Moynihan Train Hall’s 31st Street entrance is The Hive. Created by the artist duo of is a fantastical inverted cityscape inspired by iconic buildings of cities around the world including New York, Chicago, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, London, and Paris. Elmgreen and Dragset have populated their fictional metropolis with buildings of their own creation and distilled versions of global landmarks.

The illuminated stainless steel and aluminum structures hang from the ceiling like stalactites. The comparison is intentional and meant to symbolize the evolution of human shelter from cave dwellings to the sprawling urban cities we have today.  Info

Elmgreen & Dragset gratefully acknowledge their studio (Niklas Schumacher, Margo Lauras, Moritz Pitrowski, Rhiannon Thayer, Darius Am Wasser, Phoebe Emerson, Leona Tobien, Sasha Mballa-Ekobena) as well as Steelworks, Studio Barthelmes, UAP, Torsilieri, and Craft Engineering. Photo: Nicholas Knight courtesy Empire State Development and Public Art Fund, NY 

Claudia Wieser | Rehearsal at Brooklyn Bridge Park

"Rehearsal" by Berlin-based artist Claudia Wieser is made up of five large-scale geometric sculptures clad with hand-painted glazed tiles, panels featuring photographs of New York City in the 1980s and '90s and Roman and Greek antiquities, and mirror-polished stainless steel. They range in height from 7 to 13 feet and are encased in more than 1,000 warm and cool-toned clay tiles that were hand-painted by the artist in her Berlin studio.

The installation is meant to give passersby a moment of reflection and see themselves in the reflective artwork as "actors in their own urban narrative" as it is located at the iconic terminus of Washington Street, where the Manhattan Bridge frames the Empire State Building. Moreover, the title ‘rehearsal’ draws attention to the interplay between visitors and artwork, suggesting that the sculptures and even life itself are ever-evolving processes. 

Washington Street at the East River, Dumbo, Brooklyn Info

Haksul Lee | The Giving Tree at Flushing Meadows/Corona Park

Haksul Lee’s sculpture works to bring awareness to the environmental concerns of the Queens community. installations in two locations at the park. 

Using wind power to generate electricity, the artificial tree will light the park and provide a charger station for visitors. In addition, The Giving Tree serves as a form of altruism promoting a higher level of collective consciousness to push New Yorkers towards acknowledging and addressing the climate issues that currently affect the city and issues that stand to arise in the future. Photo. Courtesy of NYC Art in the Parks

The Giving Tree, located on a lawn bounded by Herbert Hoover Promenade, United Nations Avenue North, and Avenue of the Americas  at Flushing Meadows/Corona Park, remains on view through November 23, 2022 Info

Max Colby | They Consume Each Other at Rockefeller Center

Through lush, highly embellished, and material rich work, Max Colby reframes traditional notions of domesticity, power, and gender from a trans and non-binary perspective. Colby’s activation of material is unabashedly camp, providing a space to reimagine our relationship to gender, class, and the mundane. In the lobby of 45 Rockefeller Plaza, visitors encounter three custom installations of works from her series ‘They Consume Each Other,’ comprised of 27 sculptures sitting atop custom glass plinths in entirely mirrored vitrines.

A 125-foot mural in the concourse of 45 Rockefeller Plaza features paintings from Colby’s 2020 series which copy 18th and 19th-century Crewel embroidery works from prominent public collections paired atop contemporary sticker sets. Colby’s research on Crewel embroidery has been a pillar of her practice for over 10 years. “Popular in Colonial America and Elizabethan and Victorian England, ‘crewel’ style is known for its pastoral floral imagery, bringing a connection between ‘natural history’ and gendered labor and aesthetics. The mural at 45 Rock will be the first time this dimension of my practice is highlighted and connected to larger, more complex works.” says Colby.

Max Colby’s artwork is on view through March 27, 2022. This installation is part of Art in Focus, a series of art exhibitions produced in partnership with Art Production Fund.

The Socrates Annual | Sanctuary

During the past year and a half, places of sanctuary have been more important than ever. The artists selected through an open call were asked: how can art function as a sanctuary, a place of refuge, rest and meditation – without resorting to escapism? Above: Moko Fukuyama, “Shrine (Hell Gate Keepers)” (2021),

The eleven projects on view represent a range of interpretations, drawing from diverse communities, traditions, and artistic strategies to create unique sculptures and installations. Several threads emerge throughout the exhibition, including practices of self-care, the spiritual elements of natural phenomena, and meditations on the conditions that necessitate sanctuary. Some projects provide space for mourning modes of oppression and acknowledge that sanctuaries are not always spaces free from fear.  

For many of the artists sanctuary is not necessarily a fixed geographical location, but a time-bound space that is created and recreated against the backdrop of threats such as illness, climate change, the collapse of the social service systems, and violence of racism and colonialism. Sound – both musical and spoken words – situate and unite communities of sanctuary in many of these works, a visceral mode of communicating refuge.

On view through March 6 at Socrates Sculpture Park, 2-01 Vernon Boulevard, Long Island City, NY Info

Faith Ringgold | Windows of the Wedding #1: Woman at St. Nicholas Park

In a basketball court at St. Nicholas Park in Manhattan is Faith Ringgold’s mural Windows of the Wedding #1: Woman. The mural is part of Ringgold’s ongoing Windows of the Wedding series, which began during the 1970s after the artist began experimenting with abstract shapes. Ringgold would go on to receive critical acclaim during the 1980s for her narrative quilts. A career retrospective of her work is currently on view at The New Museum. Info

Presented by Project Backboard, Windows of the Wedding #1: Woman will be on view through August 8, 2022. Info

Sam Durant | Untitled  (drone) on the High Line

For the Plinth, Durant created a sculpture in the shape of an abstracted drone sitting atop a 25-foot-tall steel pole. Durant removes all details from the drone—decals, landing gear, cameras, weapons—rendering it as a streamlined sculpture that evokes the biomorphic forms of Constantin Brancusi or Barbara Hepworth. Shaped from white fiberglass, the sculpture hovers above 10th Avenue, rotating on its steel pole as directed by the wind. With this work, Durant seeks to make visible the intentionally obscured drone warfare perpetuated by the US, and to remind the public that drones and surveillance are a tragic, menacing, and pervasive presence in the daily lives of many living outside—and within—the United States.

“Untitled (drone) is meant to animate the question about the use of drones, surveillance, and targeted killings in places far and near, and whether as a society we agree with and want to continue these practices,” says artist Sam Durant. “Art is a place where we can speculate about alternatives, other possibilities, where we can bring forward things that are unsaid, unknown or hidden from view, and have discussions about them. Art offers us the opportunity to think about the world in new ways. In moments of crisis, this is extremely important.”

 Untitled (drone) is the second High Line Plinth commission and is on view through August 2022 at 30th St. and 10th Avenue. Info

Emily Oliveira’ | We Are At a Moment That Will Be Remembered as the Beginning of the Great Change, For Who Can Say When a Wall Is Ready To Come Down  at the Lena Horne Bandshell in Prospect Park. 

This 28-foot high mural depicts a vividly colored natural landscape inhabited by humans and gods partaking in a Promethean sense of rebirth. We Are At a Moment That Will Be Remembered…encourages viewers to use their imagination to envision and enact new ways of being in a post-COVID-era world while simultaneously celebrating the collective action against violence, hate, and separation that has taken place over the last year.

Presented by BRIC and Prospect Park Alliance in partnership with NYC Parks’ Art in the Park Program, the mural is on view through May 31, 2022 Info