Zhang Huan’s “Three Legged Buddha” was officially dedicated with a special ceremony at Storm King on October 30 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
Storm King Art Center
Old Pleasant Hill Rd., Mountainville
Wednesday – Sunday through November 14, $8-$12 (children under five free), 10:00 am – 5:00 pm
www.stormking.org
www.zhanghuan.com
On Saturday, October 30, the Storm King Art Center in upstate Mountainville celebrated Chinese artist Zhang Huan’s gift of his monumental 2007 forged-copper sculpture “Three Legged Buddha” with a special dedication ceremony that included chanting by Tibetan monks, a performance by Tibetan teen singing sensation Tenzin Kunsel, and a ritual circumambulation of the work, led by one of the monks and Zhang. Donated as part of Storm King’s fiftieth anniversary, the twenty-eight-foot-high, twelve-ton “Three Legged Buddha” consists of three giant legs facing the ground and forming an arch as if in an elaborate yoga pose with just the bottom half of a body, two feet balanced on pins, the third standing on an eight-foot-high human head, as if pushing it into the earth, or perhaps the head is rising up from below. The detailing is exquisite, from the anklets to the ears, the toes to the face.
Zhang Huan’s “Three Legged Buddha” was officially dedicated with a special ceremony at Storm King on October 30 (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
The work, which has been placed in Storm King’s South Fields amid sixty-four sugar-maple trees, is inspired by fragments of destroyed Buddhist statuary that Zhang, one of China’s most successful and innovative artists, has been collecting during his travels in Tibet. Also on view as part of Storm King’s fiftieth anniversary is “5+5: New Perspectives,” featuring outdoor works by Mark di Suvero, Andy Goldsworthy, Ursula von Rydingsvard, Maria Elena González, and Alyson Shotz, as well as the indoor exhibit “The View from Here: Storm King at Fifty,” but you better hurry, because the massive, spectacular sculpture center closes for the season November 14. And now is a particularly great time to visit, as the leaves are changing color as fall heads toward winter. Zhang’s 2010 piece “Head from Buddha Foot” is also currently on view at the 590 Atrium on Madison Ave. at 56th St.