Antony Gormley ‘Event Horizon’ New York

Following on from the success of Antony Gormley's installation Event Horizon in on London's South Bank in 2007 (see previous blog post), it moved to New York last year. Between March 26 and August 15, 2010, thirty-one life-size body sculptures of the artist, cast in iron and fibreglass, were installed on the pathways and sidewalks of Manhatten’s historic Madison Square Park, as well as the rooftops of the many architectural treasures that populate New York’s vibrant Flatiron District. Event Horizon marked Gormley’s United States public art debut - a milestone for an artist whose work has garnered worldwide acclaim over the past 25 years.
At the time Gormley commented: “I’m thrilled to be working with New York: people and place, I don’t know what is going to happen, what it will look and feel like, but I want to play with the city and people’s perceptions. My intention is to get the sculptures as close to the edge of the buildings as possible. The field of the installation should have no defining boundary. The gaze is the principle dynamic of the work; the idea of looking and finding, or looking and seeking, and in the process perhaps re-assessing your own position in the world. So in encountering these peripheral things, perhaps one becomes aware of one’s status of embedment.”