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It’s after midnight, but jackhammers and chainsaws are still roaring in downtown New York. Bit by bit, workers are dismantling Tilted Arc, a gigantic Richard Serra sculpture.
Just 10 years earlier, in 1979, the General Service Administration (GSA) had commissioned the piece. Now the same agency is tearing it down.
What gives?
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Jennifer Kotter’s photograph of Richard Serra’s Tilted Arc being destroyed on March 16, 1989.
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The GSA, a government organization in charge of maintaining public buildings, invited Serra to create a permanent public sculpture for the city’s Federal Plaza. The artist decided to go big. Really big. He built a massive steel wall and installed it two years later.
The sculpture was an unmissable 120 feet of curving steel that seemed to change as you approached it. In typical Serra style, it was minimalist, abstract and defined the space around it.
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Richard Serra, “Tilted Arc”, 1981, sculpture, ©2016 ADAGP Paris.
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As soon as it debuted, Serra’s piece caused a serious uproar. Critics saw it as a basic slab of rolled metal that blocked access to office buildings and carved up open space. They said it would be a haven for graffiti, garbage and even rats.
In 1985, the GSA held a public hearing to discuss whether to keep or remove the sculpture. Serra, who designed the piece specifically for Federal Plaza, argued that to remove it would be to destroy it. The sculpture was meant to change the way people saw and passed through the plaza. Too bad if they didn’t like it.
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Richard Serra, “Tilted Arc”, 1981, sculpture, ©2016 ADAGP Paris.
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In the end, GSA voted to take down Tilted Arc. Serra appealed the decision but lost, and his sculpture was carted off in pieces.
Turns out Berlin wasn’t the only wall to fall in 1989.
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Richard Serra, “Tilted Arc”, 1981, sculpture, ©2016 ADAGP Paris.
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I don’t think it is the function of art to be pleasing
