There’s nothing better than running into a visitor at the Kansas City Sculpture Park and hearing firsthand about their afternoon picnic or thoughts on the latest sculpture installation. But, with the Park always changing with the seasons and hours of the day, we can’t always be there to hear it in person. So with this new blog, we want to know… what do you think about the Park? What sculptures move you? What can we do better?
Show us your favorite pic or enlighten us with that Henry Moore inspired haiku… whatever is on your mind about the Park, we want to know. And we’ll do our best to keep you up to date on Park happenings, insights on artists or when the Gingko trees are in bloom. This blog will be as useful as you make it, so we hope to hear from you often.
Comments (3)
Hello - I live in Iola in south east Kansas. I've never been to your sculpture park and I will be bringing my wife and sister in October. I would like to see more pictures of the outdoor scuptures before we come,if that is possible.
Thanks
Paul Sorenson
Posted by Paul Sorenson | September 28, 2006 1:51 PM
Posted on September 28, 2006 13:51
Paul,
Please check out the new Kansas City Sculpture Park Interactive. There's a link straight off the homepage on the right side (look for the text ROOM TO PLAY). All 31 sculptures in the Park are included in the interactive. There is also information on the horticulture of the Park and the history/design of the Park.
Information on the works in the Park may also be found by clicking on the navigation at the top of any of the page on the website and selecting Art:Collections:Kansas City Sculpture Park. You will find thumbnails along the righthand side of the KCSP text and can look at every sculpture in the Park this way as well.
We hope you enjoy your trip in October. If you are here on October 26, be sure to get tickets to the lecture on Henry Moore!
Posted by Lara Kline | September 28, 2006 10:08 PM
Posted on September 28, 2006 22:08
To my colleagues who have been so wonderful about passing along scholarly and media materials that enrich my interaction with our collection;
We’ve always known that, in general, a defining aspect of sculpture is the involvement of it’s surroundings. You have (hopefully) noticed how the Moores in our Sculpture Park have changed as their surroundings have changed over the last three years. In fact Henry intended to collaborate with the birds and wind and smells surrounding his sculpture. We often forget to consciously take into account our surroundings when viewing sculptures.
We have all been instructed to get familiar with our collection. It’s part of our jobs. Now, raise your hands here; how many of you have taken off your shoes and walked barefoot through the Sculpture Park? If so, have you noticed that the sculptures actually look different in your bare feet than in shoes? (…wait 10 seconds for thinking/responding time…) Which sculptures change the most?
In my opinion it’s the Rickey, "Two Planes Verticle-Horizontal" that changes the most. The conclusion I came to is that, if viewed through a window you might conclude that the sculpture moved because it’s motorized. But outside, you know that it is wind powered because you feel the wind on your skin. Your skin helps you understand the sculpture that you can’t touch. The stronger the wind on your skin, the more active the sculpture. It occurred to me that this piece also speaks about contrasts of weight and weightlessness, flight and anchored-ness, all of which are experienced more intimately in (my) bare feet.
Experiencing an outdoor sculpture is, perhaps by definition, experiencing a collaboration between the sculptor, an architect or two, a landscaper, the foliage, and an animal or three. It is most fully experienced through as many senses as possible.
Luckily our Sculpture Park is so wonderfully maintained that it is pretty safe to walk around out there barefoot. So go. Do your job and get to know our collection as fully as possible. And, perhaps for the first time, wiggle your toes in the middle of a workday afternoon.
Posted by David Adelman | July 6, 2007 1:05 PM
Posted on July 6, 2007 13:05