Barnett Newman, Broken Obelisk (1967)
Photo: Courtesy Storm King Art Center.
The Storm King Art Center, in New Windsor, New York, has acquired three major long-term loans to add to its outdoor collection of contemporary sculpture: Tony Smith’s Source (1967), Louise Nevelson’s Royal Tide 1 (1960), and Barnett Newman’s Broken Obelisk (1967).
Of particular note is the Obelisk, a rare sculpture by Newman, who only created five others over the course of his career. The piece has been installed atop one of Storm King’s secluded hills. Newman cast three versions of the three-ton weathered steel sculpture in the late 1960s, intending the incomplete nature of the traditional civic monument to serve as a symbol of the nation’s unrest during the Vietnam War. This exhibition copy of the piece was manufactured in 2005.
Tony Smith, Source (1967)
Photo: Courtesy Storm King Art Center.
The Smith sculpture is more prominently located, positioned to greet visitors close to the Museum Hill entrance to the park. Source is one of the artist’s “presences,” designed to have a formal correspondence with the landscape, originally made for Documenta IV in Kassel, Germany. The monumental steel work weighs more than 12,000 pounds.
Nevelson created Royal Tide, an assemblage of found wood objects painted gold, for the Venice Biennale. It is one of 21 gold wall works that comprise her “Royal Tide Series.”
Louise Nevelson, Royal Tide 1 (1960)
Photo: Courtesy Storm King Art Center.