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#masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }The Presidential TransitionliveLatest UpdatesCalls for Impeachment25th Amendment ExplainedTrump Officials ResignHow Mob Stormed CapitolAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main storyFirst Inventory of Damage to U.S. Capitol Building ReleasedThe damage was largely limited to broken glass, busted doors and graffiti, the report said.Capitol Police surveyed the damage to an entrance to the U.S. Capitol building on Thursday, a day after a mob of Trump supporters broke in and vandalized the building.Credit…Jason Andrew for The New York TimesJan. 8, 2021, 6:07 p.m. ETThe office of the Architect of the Capitol in Washington, the office that preserves and maintains the building’s art and architecture, released Friday the first inventory of the damage sustained during Wednesday’s riot.Damage to the interior of the building was largely limited to broken glass, busted doors and graffiti, the report said, though it noted that statues, murals and historic benches displayed the residue of various pepper sprays, tear gas and fire extinguishers deployed by both rioters and law enforcement personnel. They will need to be carefully cleaned and conserved, the report said.Outside the building, two bronze light fixtures designed in the late 19th century by Frederick Law Olmsted, the American landscape architect, and that illuminate the grounds at night, were broken. The report also noted graffiti on the west side of the building near stands which are being constructed for the inauguration of Joseph R. Biden Jr. later this month.The Rotunda doors of the U.S. Capitol building sustained damage after rioters broke in on Wednesday. Credit…Jonathan Ernst/ReutersRioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol building on Wednesday afteroon overturned tables and smashed windows, but left the singular artwork intact.Credit…Andrew Harnik/Associated PressNo major artworks were reported damaged, despite the violent demonstrations inside the building by Trump supporters that took the Capitol Police nearly four hours to quell. A mob broke into rooms on the south side of the Capitol (including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office), smashed windows and then marched through the National Statuary Hall, waving American, Confederate and “Trump Is My President” flags.Vandals in red “Make America Great Again” hats, many of whom photographed and recorded themselves, wreaked havoc in Congressional offices and the Rotunda. One man crammed a framed photo of the Dalai Lama into his backpack, while another smoked marijuana in a room with maps of Oregon on the wall. A 19th-century marble bust of former President Zachary Taylor was defaced with a red substance that looked like blood.Workers cleaned up broken glass and debris inside the U.S. Capitol building on Thursday.Credit…Brendan Smialowski/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut the large-scale, 18-foot paintings by Trumbull and other artists that depict scenes from the republic’s founding in the Rotunda, and the dozens of statues that fill the National Statuary Hall to the south that filled the background of many of the rioters’ photos, all appear to have escaped damage.The office noted on Thursday that many of its employees had worked through the night to clean up the trash, glass and other debris that littered the building and begin repair work.“Wednesday was a difficult day for our campus,” the architect of the Capitol, J. Brett Blanton, said in a statement. “As the Architect of the Capitol mission calls us to serve, preserve and inspire, it was particularly hard to watch the scene unfold.”AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More
Art
Craft#assemblage
#birds
#feathers
#sculpture
#T.A.G. Smith
#woodJuly 18, 2022
Grace Ebert More
“Almanac” (2024), installation view, acrylic on Mylar. Photos by Julia Featheringill. All images courtesy of Carly Glovinski, Morgan Lehman Gallery, and MASS MoCA, shared with permission
Hundreds of Huge Flowers Spring Forth in Carly Glovinski’s Monumental ‘Almanac’
April 24, 2025
ArtNature
Kate Mothes
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“Gardening gives one back a sense of proportion about everything—except itself,” author May Sarton (1912-1995) wrote in her book Plant Dreaming Deep (1968), a journal about discovering a love of tending to the land. For Carly Glovinski (previously), the sentiment incidentally frames something of a raison d’être for the artist’s remarkable large-scale floral installation at MASS MoCA.
Glovinski was especially moved by Sarton’s book The House by the Sea (1977), which traces the author’s move from New Hampshire to the seacoast of Maine. The vibrancy of gardens spurred the artist’s fascination with flowers, culminating recently in an expansive work titled “Almanac.”
Celebrating the diversity and dynamism of blooms, the piece explores ideas around placemaking and the passage of time. “For Glovinski, the garden is a metaphor for collapsed time and perishable memories,” says an exhibition statement. Along with Sarton, the artist also draws on poet Emily Dickinson’s love for plants, channeling literary reflections on connecting with the simple pleasures—and sublime chaos—of nature.
“Almanac” takes its name from the annual guide that forecasts weather and a provides calendars for astronomical events, tides, and planting. The piece took more than a year to complete and comprises hundreds of pressed flower paintings made with washy acrylic paint applied to both sides of semi-transparent mylar. The gestural brushstrokes on translucent material evoke a sense of lightness and delicacy, like real petals blown up to larger-than-life size. Above the installation, she’s labeled segments with the months the blooms appear.
Glovinski references pressed blossoms that she has grown, harvested, or collected from friends, nodding to Emily Dickinson’s love of the practice. (The poet created a stunning herbarium containing 424 specimens collected around her home in Amherst, Massachusetts.) “By observing, tending, and preserving flowers, ‘Almanac’ becomes both a visual record of the seasons and a commentary on the labor of care,” the museum says.
See more on Glovinski’s website and Instagram.
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Art#installation
#plastic
#sustainabilityJuly 19, 2020
Grace Ebert“Floating MAiZE.” All images © Jean Shin and Ryan Muir, shared with permission
In her installation “Floating MAiZE,” artist Jean Shin employs more than 7,000 plastic bottles to create a stunning suspension above an atrium at Brookfield Place. The window-lined space allows light to refract through the translucent tendrils, which are hung in a staggered, circular shape. Layered with sustainable practices, the latest installation reuses the green, plastic bottles from the 2017 project, “MAiZE,” which utilized Mountain Dew that was consumed and collected in Iowa, the nation’s leader in corn production. Living and working in Brooklyn, Shin also sourced some pieces from Sure We Can, a nonprofit recycling center in her neighborhood.
The recycled piece falls at the intersection of environmental consciousness and commentary on food consumption in the United States. “Following the food chain from industrial-scale agricultural practice producing corn in America that ends up being consumed as high fructose corn syrup in soda and other processed foods, served up in plastics that become harmful pollutants in our oceans,” the artist writes on Instagram.
Shin tells Colossal that her works help to expose “the interdependency of their consumer habits to the larger ecosystem,” which she elaborates on by saying:
I use everyday objects and detritus that are often overlooked or obsolete to transform them into large scale installations. The lifecycle and accumulation of these consumer objects have a huge environmental impact. I am interested in where these materials come from, where they end up and who engages with them.
Along with her sweeping piece “The Last Straw,” “Floating MAiZE” will be on view through August 30 at Winter Garden at Brookfield Place. (via Hyperallergic)#installation
#plastic
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MoreAll images courtesy of Abi Castillo, shared with permission
Nature Alights on Cheerful Faces in Abi Castillo’s Ceramic Sculptures
December 3, 2024
ArtCraft
Kate Mothes
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Whether sprouting flowers for spectacles or summoning bluebirds, Abi Castillo’s playful characters mirror our inner selves, one another, and the world around us.
“When I was little, they called me ‘Big Eyes,’ a name I received with pride, since it is an inheritance from my paternal grandmother, whom I barely knew but who stood out for her big eyes and powerful gaze,” Castillo (previously) says in a statement. “Carrying this legacy makes me aware of the importance of knowing where I come from and where I belong.”
Through standalone sculptures and functional objects, Castillo emphasizes the act of seeing. Eyes are everywhere, looking back at the viewer as a reminder to reflect on what the artist describes as “this ephemeral, hectic, and hostile life.” She adds, “Each of my characters also holds a reflection of myself, of my connection with nature and of that little girl that I still carry inside…”
Castillo is looking forward to moving to a larger studio soon, and she is currently busy making new sculptures, experimenting with different techniques to explore new shapes and formats, like jewelry. Find more on her website, and stay up-to-date on Instagram.
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