Will The Latest Public Art Installation Cause Panic?

A sculpture on Pentagram Design's office, via 1010Wins

That Antony Gormley public art installation, that will most definitely up the 911 call count, is now being installed on rooftops around the city. All in all 31 statues of bodies will be placed on top of buildings near Madison Square Park, including the Flatiron and the Empire State Building. There will also be a few placed on the ground, but the ones that look like jumpers have authorities a little concerned.

A spokesperson for the NYPD told WCBS, "we were notified because of concerns the public might misperceive what they see and call police. We will respond no matter what because you can have an actual jumper at the same building." However, the Madison Square Park Conservancy, sponsoring the installation (called Event Horizon), says they do not believe the statues will confuse New Yorkers.

Gormley, the man behind the madness, says while he's installing the sculptures he'll be trying to get them "as close to the edge of the buildings as possible." So the next big wind storm should be interesting. The bodies will all be installed by the 26th of this month, and on view through August 15th.

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By Jen Carlson in Arts & Entertainment on March 10, 2010 4:10 PM

Comments [rss]

recee

Why is my cat wearing my brasiere on his head?

ozik

Why is Antony Gormley installing work at all? The guy is an awful, awful artist. He should slip back into the void of making expensive garden art for the uber tacky.

Mordicai

OMG STATUES HOW WILL THE CITY BE ABLE TO HANDLE IT! CHAOS! NOT STATUES, ANYTHING BY STATUES!

BklynsFinest

It's like an NYU Undergrad Memorial

Ed

Here is my idea for a public art installation: big inflatable rats opposite random buildings throughout Manhattan.

Spirit of 76

Would work a lot better with a nice, brightly colored cape fluttering in the wind.

Kelles

Oh yeah! that'll be cool ... and instead of a guy it should be a giant mouse...yeah, like Mighty Mouse!

AFineLyne

The art looks wonderful. The placement a top buildings is going to cause quite a stir - but then, maybe that is what art is meant to do - cause quite a stir.

Another piece to this could be footage of reactions to this exhibit on the ground. People watching in Madison Sq Park this Spring/Summer will be so interesting.

AFineLyne

www.afinelyne.com

Darrell

Honestly, if there's just a static figure up there, it would be hard to say that its an actual person. A real life jumper would either be moving around nervously or would have already jumped off anyway. Plus these statue have a copper color, your not likely to find too many people jumping off of a building in a full body copper colored suit.

Snoopy

You want to bet? This is New York City we're talking about.

REALITY CHECK

Calm down, people. There's been a life-size statue of Lenin atop the Red Square building on the Lower East Side for over twenty years, and it hasn't caused a panic.

S.K.

It caused a revolution

FDTW

Please approve my hilarious comment mr. blog owner.

fosiacat

terrible, terrible terrible idea. who the fuck approved this? kids get in trouble for causing public panic. how is this any different?

about as stupid as the "gates" in central park, but at least central park was just pointless not pointless and likely to cause panic and waste tax dollars on false 911 calls.