Red Grooms’s latest monumental sculptures line Midtown walkway (photo by twi-ny/mdr)
Marlborough New York
Walkway between Fifth & Sixth Aves. and West 56th & 57th Sts.
Admission: free
212-541-4900
www.marlboroughgallery.com
flickr slideshow
Nearly all Midtown galleries are closed Sundays and Mondays, but there’s a small outdoor venue that never closes and is always worth passing through. In the walkway between Fifth & Sixth Aves. and West 56th & 57th Sts., the Marlborough Gallery (40 West 57th St.) regularly displays sculptures from its collection. Right now is the best mix they’ve had in years, having recently added three colorful nine-foot-tall enamel-on-aluminum sculptures from Red Grooms’s late 2009 “Dancing” show in the gallery. Grooms’s whimsical nature is more than evident in “Swan Lake,” “Tango Dancers,” and “Charleston,” his monumental works adding color to the otherwise gray alley that also includes Nobu 57. The playfulness continues with Tom Otterness’s “Large Cocqui,” a cute oversized frog staring right at the viewer. Several years ago, Manolo Verdes’s queen series took over Bryant Park; “Reina Mariana” has made the trek uptown, holding court in the alley. And Fernando Botero’s “Rape of Europa” features the Phoenician princess lying atop Zeus the bull. In addition, vertical pieces by Beverly Pepper and Arnald Pomodoro stand tall.