Inside The New York Botanical Garden
Manolo Valdes
Posted in Exhibitions on September 13 2012, by Matt Newman
We’re suckers for a good surprise (as long as we’re the ones behind it). But it’s a spot more difficult to keep the main event under wraps when it comes to exhibitions this impressive. Manolo Valdés casts a formidable shadow, sparing nothing to create some of the most striking–and colossal–visuals for our upcoming Monumental Sculpture exhibit; for the uninitiated, that’s our next major show here at the NYBG. And this week we jumped headlong into preparation for the September 22 opening.
All told, we couldn’t exactly sneak these sculptures into the Garden. Some of them, such as the Alhambra piece, weigh in at 40,000 pounds with spans reaching nearly 50 lateral feet; they’re not what you’d call statuettes. Arranging these monoliths has proven a spectacle in itself, drawing streams of visitors and employees alike, all snapping away with their cameras as we uncrate and maneuver massive heads and latticework by truck-mounted cranes. It’s a careful and dramatic process that we were able to capture a bit of in the last couple of days.
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Posted in Exhibitions on August 27 2012, by Karen Daubmann
Ed. Note: While Monet’s Garden continues to enamor thousands of visitors to the NYBG through the fall, we’re always preparing for new and intriguing exhibitions. This includes our latest artistic explorations, which will culminate with a long-awaited unveiling in late September: the renowned sculptures of Manolo Valdés. As our Director of Exhibitions and Seasonal Displays, Karen Daubmann offers an advance glimpse into the artist’s creative process.
A few of us were lucky enough to have the opportunity to visit the New York studio of artist Manolo Valdés a few weeks back. We were working on a plan for exhibiting his maquettes in the Orchid Rotunda of the Library Building during the course of his exhibition, Manolo Valdés: Monumental Sculpture. Though the exhibit on the grounds opens on September 22, the maquette display will open on November 3.
Maquettes are small-scale models of artworks which help an artist to develop an idea. You can think of it as a rough draft, or a sort of “sketch” of a sculpture, which helps the artist to visualize and test shapes and ideas without incurring the costs and effort necessary to produce the full-sized piece. You can see from the photos below the variety of ways in which Valdés has explored the butterfly motif in his work.
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We’re suckers for a good surprise (as long as we’re the ones behind it). But it’s a spot more difficult to keep the main event under wraps when it comes to exhibitions this impressive. Manolo Valdés casts a formidable shadow, sparing nothing to create some of the most striking–and colossal–visuals for our upcoming Monumental Sculpture exhibit; for the uninitiated, that’s our next major show here at the NYBG. And this week we jumped headlong into preparation for the September 22 opening.