The cover of the issue is devoted to a proposed WTC light monument by Proun Space Studio, consisting of two rectangular arrays of projectors pointing straight up into the night sky, creating a spectre of the WTC towers. I wonder if they will give any credit to Albert Speer's "Cathedral of Light"? http://faculty-web.at.northwestern.edu/art-history/werckmeister/April_29_199 9/Rally1.jpg I hope that Myoda's "Phantom Towers" is picked instead of this fascist-inspired piece.
Hakki
OCR'ed from Art in America Nov. 2001 pp 35,37,76,77,79. PDF available in 120 dpi (2.5 Mb), 72 dpi (1.2 Mb) or 72 dpi without fonts (670 Kb). ------------------------------------- US Museums Respond to Crisis
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In the cities that were attacked, officials of art institutions had personal and passionate responses to the catastrophe. Maxwell Anderson, director of New York's Whitney Museum of American Art, said that the museum lost a volunteer on Sept. I I: Susan Misckowicz, who also held a job with the Port Authority and was working in the World Trade Center that day. Anderson's first concern was for her family and for staff members whose relatives and friends were also victims. The Whitney is exploring fund-raising ideas to benefit the victims families and also to aid lower Manhattan artists by providing temporary work space and a place to exhibit for those who lost their studios or are not able to work in them. Anderson is also trying to help bolster the city's creative spirit and to reinforce the museum's place as one of tolerance in the midst of the fervent nationalism that followed on the heels of the disaster. The Whitney seeks to reaffirm its relationship to the community as a locus for public dialogue on topics such as freedom of speech and patriotism, underscoring the notion that the country's strength has always been its wealth of cultural and ethnic variety.
Citing a range of public comments regarding certain works in the museum s collection and exhibition program, Anderson noted that Jasper Johns's Three Flags (1958) has become the focus of considerable attention in recent weeks. A number of museum visitors have requested that this iconic work be shied from the permanent collection galleries upstairs and re-hung in a more prominent place near the museum entrance. And some viewers have found inappropriate at this time a powerful painting by the late Martin Wong, Big Heat (1988), which shows two firemen embracing in front of a charred tenement building. As we go to press, these works have stayed put Other museum-goers have suggested that the upcoming Whitney Biennial be refo- cused to address the recent terrorist attacks. Anderson asserted that the exhibition, which has taken two years to prepare, will remain on track, though its texture and context will inevitably be shaped by the tragedies of Sept. 11.
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