Mad. Sq. Art Announces PET SOUNDS, 5/2-9/9

Mad. Sq. Art announces Pet Sounds, an interactive, large-scale, mixed-media installation by acclaimed California-based artist Charles Long.

 

Sited on Madison Square Park’s expansive Oval Lawn, Pet Sounds will introduce a snaking network of vibrantly colored pipe railings creating new paths as they wind across the urban oasis. As these railings converge around a common seating area, each railing begins to grow into what's being described as "a unique fantastic form. While the shape of each blob suggests a different set of associations, their uncanny semblances remain wonderfully elusive.

 

"As viewers smooth their hands over the undulating biomorphic surfaces, the act of touching produces a variety of sounds and vibrations coming from within the sculpturalforms."

 

The installation, commissioned by Mad. Sq. Art, will remain on view daily from May 2 – September 9, 2012.

 

Artist Charles Long comments, "My re-occurring interest in the uncanny over many years is in full effect here in the Pet Sounds project where something as familiar and literally grounding as a handrail morphs into an unnamable blob that has a very physical presence with some power to dialog with the viewer's own somatic sense. As one pets the blobs, a wide range of sounds are triggered and are coming from within the bodies of the forms. The sounds and the sculptural forms connect to the physicality of the viewer and by extension to those of others that are touching the work. I wanted the work to be as visually affecting to park visitors as it is a physical and aural experience for them. I can't wait to see people sitting on a park bench next to one of these bright orange blobs. Generally, when I look at people looking at my sculptures I just see more sculpture. With Madison Square Park's almost maze-like repeating patterns of arching pathways, and the way people and their pets are leisurely enjoying these splendid green spaces, I hope I might be an interloper into the park visitors’ unconscious, into what Freud has called the 'free floating attention.' I like the idea of Pet Sounds becoming a part of the collective memory, and even dreams, of the unique experiences of New York City."