Coinciding with the 65th anniversary of the Glass House and its 2014 tour season, the Glass House will present Fujiko Nakaya: Veil, the first site-specific artist project to engage the iconic Glass House itself, designed by Philip Johnson and completed in 1949.

Nakaya, a Japanese artist who has produced fog sculptures and environments internationally, will wrap the Glass House (by Philip Johnson) in a veil of dense mist that comes and goes. For approximately 10 to 15 minutes each hour, the Glass House will appear to vanish, only to return as the fog dissipates. Inside the structure, the sense of being outdoors will be temporarily suspended during the misty spells.

Veil will stage a potent dialogue with the Glass House, producing an opaque atmosphere to meet the building’s extreme transparency and temporal effects that complement its timelessness. According to Glass House Director Henry Urbach, “Johnson’s interest in the balance of opposites is evident throughout the Glass House campus. With Nakaya’s temporary installation, we carry this sensibility to its endpoint while allowing the unique magic of the Glass House — the dream of transparency, an architecture that vanishes — to return again and again as the fog rises and falls.”

The Glass House, situated on a promontory overlooking a valley, is subject to changing wind patterns, as well as variable temperature and humidity, that will continually influence the interchange between Veil and the building it shrouds. Fresh water, pumped at high pressure through 600 nozzles, will produce an immersive environment that reveals these dynamic conditions. According to Nakaya, “Fog responds constantly to its own surroundings, revealing and concealing the features of the environment. Fog makes visible things become invisible and invisible things — like wind — become visible.” The drama of Nakaya’s work rests in the continuous interplay between what is visible and what is not. Known coordinates vanish, only to be replaced by a miasma, rich in changing phenomenological effects, that evoke a sense of mystery, foreboding, and wonder.

This installation is part of a greater initiative to transform the Glass House campus into a center for contemporary art and ideas, in particular those that foster new interpretations of the historic site’s meanings. The exhibition will be accompanied by public programs at the Glass House and in New York City.

The Glass House, built between 1949 and 1995 by architect Philip Johnson, is a National Trust Historic Site located in New Canaan, CT. The pastoral 49-acre landscape comprises fourteen structures, including the Glass House (1949), and features a permanent collection of 20th-century painting and sculpture, along with temporary exhibitions. The tour season runs from May to November and advance reservations are required. For more information, please visit www.theglasshouse.org.

Organized by Henry Urbach, Director and Chief Curator, and Irene Shum Allen, Curator and Collections Manager.

Visitor Information.-

The Glass House Visitor Center and Design Store
199 Elm Street, New Canaan, CT 06840
Open Thursday – Monday, 9:30 a.m. – 5:30 p.m. Tickets start at $30, including tour of the site.
For general information, please call 203.594.9884 or visit the Glass House online: www.theglasshouse.org.

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Fujiko Nakaya nació en Sapporo, Japón, en 1933. Su padre, Ukichiro Nakaya, un físico acreditado con la fabricación de los primeros copos de nieve artificial, impacto en su trabajo y cuando era una joven estudiante de arte, se interesó en trabajar con formularios tipo nube. En 1970, en la Exposición Mundial de Osaka, Japón, Nakaya creó la primera escultura de niebla del mundo cuando ella envolvió el Pabellón de Pepsi en una niebla vaporosa, en colaboración con el conocido Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.).

Nakaya ha creado instalaciones de niebla por todo el mundo, incluidos los proyectos para el Museo Guggenheim  Bilbao, el Grand Palais, París, la Galería Nacional de Australia, Canberra, y el Exploratorium, San Francisco, entre otros. Fue asesora con los arquitectos Diller Scofidio + Renfro en el Edificio Blur para la Expo suiza de 2002, y ha trabajado con numerosos artistas (incluyendo Trisha Brown, David Tudor, y Bill Viola ) en ambientes de música y representación. Esta será su primera instalación a gran escala en la Costa Este de los Estados Unidos y la primera vez que su trabajo ha sido presentado en un sitio histórico de renombre internacional.

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Philip Johnson was born in Cleveland, Ohio. He was descended from the Jansen family of New Amsterdam, and included among his ancestors the Huguenot Jacques Cortelyou, who laid out the first town plan of New Amsterdam for Peter Stuyvesant. He attended the Hackley School, in Tarrytown, New York, and then studied at Harvard University as an undergraduate, where he focused on history and philosophy, particularly the work of the Pre-Socratic philosophers. Johnson interrupted his education with several extended trips to Europe. These trips became the pivotal moment of his education; he visited Chartres, the Parthenon, and many other ancient monuments, becoming increasingly fascinated with architecture.

In 1928 Johnson met with architect Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who was at the time designing the German Pavilion for the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition. The meeting was a revelation for Johnson and formed the basis for a lifelong relationship of both collaboration and competition.

Johnson returned from Germany as a proselytizer for the new architecture. Touring Europe more comprehensively with his friends Alfred H. Barr, Jr. and Henry-Russell Hitchcock to examine firsthand recent trends in architecture, the three assembled their discoveries as the landmark show "Modern Architecure: International Exhibition" in the Heckscher Building for the Museum of Modern Art, in 1932. The show and their simultaneously published book "International Style: Modern Architecture Since 1922" was profoundly influential and is seen as the introduction of modern architecture to the American public. It celebrated such pivotal architects as Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, and Mies van der Rohe. The exhibition was also notable for a controversy: architect Frank Lloyd Wright withdrew his entries in pique that he was not more prominently featured.

As critic Peter Blake has stated, the importance of this show in shaping American architecture in the century "cannot be overstated."[citation needed] In the book accompanying the show, coauthored with Hitchcock, Johnson argued that the new modern style maintained three formal principles: 1. an emphasis on architectural volume over mass (planes rather than solidity) 2. a rejection of symmetry and 3. rejection of applied decoration.[citation needed] The definition of the movement as a "style" with distinct formal characteristics has been seen by some critics as downplaying the social and political bent that many of the European practitioners shared.

Johnson continued to work as a proponent of modern architecture, using the Museum of Modern Art as a bully pulpit. He arranged for Le Corbusier's first visit to the United States in 1935, then worked to bring Mies and Marcel Breuer to the US as emigres.

From 1932 to 1940, Johnson openly sympathized with Fascism and Nazism. He expressed antisemitic ideas and was involved in several right-wing and fascist political movements. Hoping for a fascist candidate for President, Johnson reached out to Huey Long and Father Coughlin. Following trips to Nazi Germany where he witnessed the attack on Poland and contacts with German intelligence, the Office of Naval Intelligence marked him as suspected of being a spy but he was never charged. Regarding this period in his life, he later said, "I have no excuse (for) such unbelievable stupidity... I don't know how you expiate guilt." In 1956, Johnson attempted to do just that and donated his design for a building of worship to what is now one of the country's oldest Jewish congregations, Congregation Kneses Tifereth Israel in Port Chester, New York. According to one source "all critics agree that his design of the Port Chester Synagogue can be considered as his attempt to ask for forgiveness"  for his admitted "stupidity" in being a Nazi sympathizer. The building, which stands today, is a "crisp juxtaposition of geometric forms".

During the Great Depression, Johnson resigned his post at MoMA to try his hand at journalism and agrarian populist politics. His enthusiasm centered on the critique of the liberal welfare state, whose "failure" seemed to be much in evidence during the 1930s. As a correspondent, Johnson observed the Nuremberg Rallies in Germany and covered the invasion of Poland in 1939. The invasion proved the breaking point in Johnson's interest in journalism or politics and he returned to enlist in the US Army. After a couple of self-admittedly undistinguished years in uniform, Johnson returned to the Harvard Graduate School of Design to finally pursue his ultimate career of architect.

Among his works is The Glass House, where he lived until his death, the headquarters of AT & T, the National Centre for Performing Arts of India, the Crystal Cathedral in California, the Four Seasons Restaurant in the Seagram Building, the Lincoln Center in NY or Puerta de Europa towers in Madrid.
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Published on: February 17, 2014
Cite: "The Glass House presents Fujiko Nakaya: Veil. Balance of opposites" METALOCUS. Accessed
<http://www.metalocus.es/en/news/glass-house-presents-fujiko-nakaya-veil-balance-opposites> ISSN 1139-6415
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