INDIANAPOLIS.- The Indianapolis Museum of Art today unveiled the concepts for eight site-specific commissions, which will inaugurate its new IMA Virginia B. Fairbanks Art & Nature Park when it opens in fall 2009. The first in a series of ongoing commissions, the eight inaugural artists, Atelier Van Lieshout, Kendall Buster, Alfredo Jaar, Jeppe Hein, Los Carpinteros, Tea Mäkipää, Type A, and Andrea Zittel, will create semipermanent site-specific works that explore and respond to the varied environments of the Fairbanks Art & Nature Park.

Located on 100 acres of untamed woodlands, wetlands, a lake, and meadows adjacent to the Museum, Fairbanks Art & Nature Park will be one of the largest museum art parks in the country and the only one to feature the ongoing commission of site-specific artworks. The IMA’s goal is to present contemporary art projects and exhibitions that provoke a reexamination of humanity’s complicated relationship with the environment.

“Today, when human impact on the environment has emerged as one of the critical issues of our time, Fairbanks Art and Nature Park provides an unparalleled venue for artists to create works that are inspired by this distinctive and delicate space,” stated Maxwell L. Anderson, the Melvin & Bren Simon Director and CEO of the IMA. “Through time and across cultures, artists have played a major role in helping to illuminate our relationship with nature, as illustrated in works found throughout our collections. Our eight inaugural artists have proposed innovative
and creative new works which are tailored to the Park’s unique geography, but address issues which resonate on a global level.”

The Art & Nature Park site is bordered by the White River and runs contiguous to the IMA’s current 52-acre campus, more than half of which is comprised of historic landscapes and gardens. Commissions will be ongoing, with additional artists’ projects to be announced annually. The land, a former gravel pit, has evolved through a natural reclamation into its current state of untamed woodlands, wetlands, and a 35-acre lake. The IMA has engaged architect Marlon Blackwell and landscape architect Edward L. Blake to work with the selected artists to transform the 100 acres into an unparalleled art park.

Concepts for the eight inaugural installations include:

Atelier Van Lieshout: Joop van Lieshout, with his studio Atelier van Lieshout, will present Funky Bones, a group of 20 benches with drawings of large bones that will together form the shape of an enormous, stylized human skeleton. The work grows out of ideas about native heritage and cultural development, with bones iconicly referring to artifacts and remains from previous occupants. The artist, who encountered visitors sitting on rocks and other natural perches on his visit to Indianapolis, wanted to create benches as sites for resting in the Art & Nature Park. Two locations for the installation are under consideration, either in one large grouping in the park’s central meadow, or dispersed in various locations throughout the park.

Kendall Buster: The artist has developed designs for a dock-like structure or a series of such structures that will echo the curves of the existing landscape. The
dock/platforms will extend gently into the lake, providing access to the water or simply a place to sit. In response to the fishing spots Buster discovered while exploring the site, she has conceived of either a single dock/fishing platform or three smaller versions of the structure scattered at various points.

Jeppe Hein: Jeppe Hein produces experiential, architectural, and kinetic artworks that are often activated by the audience. After multiple site visits over the course of a year, the artist is in the process of developing a work that might be, in his words, a “subtle” piece that “not everyone will notice” at first glance, such as a bush or tree that will respond to the approach of Art & Nature Park visitors. Hein will have a corollary component exhibited in the IMA’s Forefront galleries, which will be conceived as a counterpart to the Park commission piece.

Los Carpinteros: The artist collective is developing a large-scale installation in the Art & Nature Park that continues the collective’s interest in the juxtaposition of the practical and the imaginary. In consideration of the park site, Los Carpinteros draws inspiration from recent sculpture series, including Portaaviones and Zambódromo, which combine the idea of the swimming pool with unexpected elements such as aircraft carriers and outdoor dance arenas. Alterations of scale will figure into the collective’s project for the IMA, looking to improvise on the form and design of basic building materials.

Tea Mäkipää: Mäkipää will create a sculptural profile of a ship emerging from the Art & Nature Park’s lake. With its name, Eden 2, painted on each side, the ship is a modernday ark seemingly filled with human passengers. The artist proposes to use multimedia audio-visual devices to represent the boat’s interior.

Type A: The art collaborative is producing a real time conceptual performance in the form of a team-building initiative with the Art & Nature Park’s interdepartmental staff. Type A has been training in the Adventure and Experiential Learning industry in order to facilite team-building exercises with Park staff in Indianapolis. In addition to the performative aspects, the project will generate two and three-dimensional and timebased artwork, including a large sculpture inspired by the design of challenge course elements, and photographic and video documentation of staff training sessions.

Andrea Zittel: Zittel is developing a design for a large floating island to be installed in the lake of the Art & Nature Park. The island will be functional and inhabitable, with an interior space that can be approached by rowboat and explored by park visitors. With many uses, including picnics, classes, and various exploratory journeys, the island will be an experiment in modular living, examining the daily needs of contemporary human beings.

“What makes our park exceptional is that we’re not simply inserting existing sculptures into the landscape,” said Lisa Freiman, Senior Curator of Contemporary Art and Director of the Fairbanks Art & Nature Park. “Unlike most sculpture parks, the Fairbanks will feature ongoing, temporary commissions, and each piece will be created specifically in response to the Park’s unique environment. We’re promoting experimentation and providing a platform for emerging artists to engage with our community.”

Danish artist Jeppe Hein was recently comissioned for one of the inagural installations. He replaces Haluk Akace, whose project will not go forward due to unforseen scheduling conflicts. A project by Peter Eisenman has also been postponed to the second phase of commissions.

Following a detailed study and anaylsis of the site, and in consultation with artist Mary Miss, the IMA has also decided not to pursue a planned 1,500 square-foot bridge and walkway which was to connect the IMA with the Park. As plans progressed, IMA realized that the bridge, to be constructed from 600 tons of steel, would have an enormous impact on the natural environment, in conflict with the Park’s mission. The IMA and Mary Miss now are exploring other possible ways to collaborate, including an independent permanent sculpture that would address some of the environmental issues the artist has explored throughout her career. Visitors will have access to the Park using the historic Pony Truss pedestrian bridge and through two new pedestrian entrances on the north and south sides, which will allow for more circulation around the IMA’s entire campus.

As planning for the Park has evolved, so too has society’s understanding of the delicate balance between humans and nature. First conceived in the 1990s to connect the Museum to the natural environment, today the Park is part of a broader mission at the IMA which promotes environmentally-friendly and sustainable practices. IMA’s environmental philosophy includes examining the potential impact of the art and other structures on the Park itself. In keeping with that theme, IMA is working with the Park’s architect, Marlon Blackwell, to create one 3,000 square-foot structure that is functional, aesthetically innovative, LEED-certified, and will provide visitors with restrooms, emergency phones, and shelter.

To date, IMA has raised $23.3 million toward the Park’s campaign goal of $25 million, which constitutes the third phase of the IMA’s expansion program. Institutional upgrades also included an expansion and renovation of the Museum’s building in 2005 and the renovation of Oldfields–Lilly House & Gardens, completed in 2002.

A National Advisory Committee of four distinguished leaders in the fields of art and architecture assisted the IMA in developing plans for the Fairbanks Art & Nature Park. The advisors included: John Beardsley, senior lecturer in the landscape architecture department at Harvard Design School; Mary Beebe, director of the Stuart Collection, University of California, San Diego; Reed Kroloff, director of Cranbrook Academy of Art and Art Museum in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, and former editor of Architecture magazine; and Ned Rifkin, former Undersecretary for Art at the Smithsonian.