Right smack dab in the middle of townI’ve found a paradise that’s trouble proof…up on the roof.
The MET Roof Garden at the Metropolitan Museum of Art has reopened after, sadly, not hosting an installation last year.
I look forward to the annual rooftop rendezvous which offers incredible city views and unique exhibits.
This year American artist Lauren Halsey was commissioned to create a site-specific installation for The MET’s Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden entitled, “eastside of south central los angeles hieroglyph prototype architecture.”
Halsey has created a full-scale architectural structure imbued with the energy and imagination of the South Central Los Angeles community where she was born (1987), continues to work and hopefully, plans to transform many of the empty South Central lots that represent the urban blight.
The installation is designed to be viewed up close by museum patrons who are physically permitted to explore its connections to sources as varied as ancient Egyptian symbolism, 1960s utopian architecture and contemporary visual expressions such as tagging that reflect the ways in which people aspire to make public places their own.
Composed of more than 750 glass-fiber-reinforced concrete tiles, Halsey’s four-walled structure rises 22 feet in the air and is visible from Central Park.
The structure sits on a 2,500-square-foot floor surrounded by decorative tiles and guarded by four sphinx sculptures, their heads carved with the faces of the artist’s longtime girlfriend, Monique McWilliams, her brother, Dominic, her cousin Aujane and her mother, Glenda, a preschool teacher who supplied Halsey with her first art materials.
It was a splendid day up on the roof.
Take the tour:
Eastside of south central los angeles hieroglyph prototype architecture. Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden At Metropolitan Museum of Art 1000 Fifth Avenue New York City. Exhibit runs through October 22, 2023.
