Josephine Baker Spotted Near Times Square:
Josephine Baker has arrived in Manhattan, courtesy Kiki Smith. The multi-faceted artist has rendered the fabulous, American-born toast of Paris, along with the multi-hued shooting stars that surround her, in stained glass, installing them in a decidedly unglamorous venue—a rubble-strewn lot at 46th Street and 8th Avenue. The site, in the heart of the Theater District, is called, reasonably enough, “The Last Lot,” by the Art Production Fund, which borrowed it from the Shubert Organization and presented the project in conjunction with the Times Square Alliance.
The piece, called Chorus, holds its own in the cacophonous scene by refusing to compete with it. The star, bedecked in pearls with one breast artfully exposed, presides over her entourage, glistening and translucent, out of reach but visible through a chain-link fence. They they form an improbable garden of jewels in the high-tech, honky-tonk setting.
Chorus offers its touch of glass through September 4.
Photo © BFA/Courtesy Art Production Fund.
Loading...
