Iván Argote’s Dinosaur will be flying off from the High Line soon (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
FAREWELL, DINOSAUR
High Line Plinth on the High Line Spur
Thirtieth St. at Tenth Ave.
Friday, March 21, free, noon – 4:00
www.thehighline.org
It promises to be the biggest send-off for a New York City pigeon ever.
On June 14, 2025, the High Line welcomed Iván Argote’s High Line Plinth commission, Dinosaur, with “Pigeon Fest,” a festival celebrating pigeons, urban ecology, and public art on National Pigeon Appreciation Day. The High Line is now saying goodbye to the seventeen-foot-tall, one-ton aluminum pigeon sculpture on March 21 with another party, “Farewell, Dinosaur,” consisting of games, photo ops, and more, with Argote, DJ Tommy Sparks, and Miriam Abrahams, the British multidisciplinary artist who won the Pigeon Impersonation Pageant at the opening. Visitors are encouraged to again come in feather-brained costumes as they play bingo and have Argote sign limited-edition posters.
“The name Dinosaur makes reference to the sculpture’s scale and to the pigeon’s ancestors who millions of years ago dominated the globe, as we humans do today,” the Colombia-born, Paris-based Argote said in a statement. “The name also serves as a reference to the dinosaur’s extinction. Like them, one day we won’t be around anymore, but perhaps a remnant of humanity will live on — as pigeons do — in the dark corners and gaps of future worlds. I feel this sculpture could generate an uncanny feeling of attraction, seduction, and fear among the inhabitants of New York.”
The attraction, seduction, and fear will continue through early April, when Dinosaur will go extinct on the High Line, replaced by Tuan Andrew Nguyen’s The Light That Shines Through the Universe.
[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer; you can follow him on Substack here.]