LINCOLN, MASS.- DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum is presenting Architectural Allusions, an international group exhibition of new commissions, long-term loans, and permanent collection works that explores the presence of architecture in contemporary sculpture. Using concrete, granite, glass, and other materials, exhibiting artists reinvent architectural traditions from ancient ziggurats to modernist pavilions. One of deCordova’s first themed outdoor exhibitions, Architectural Allusions opened July 8, 2015, and will be on view in the Sculpture Park through May 1, 2016.

The exhibition features work by Stephanie Cardon, Dan Graham, Esther Kläs, Sol LeWitt, Monika Sosnowska, Kenneth Snelson, and Oscar Tuazon.

Architectural Allusions includes three commissions created specifically for deCordova. Boston-based sculptor Stephanie Cardon presents Beacon, constructed of two 11-foot tall concrete pillars connected by planes of thin electric yellow cables. The structure forms a passageway that visitors can walk under and look up through to experience the optical vibrations of the fluorescent cable lattice. German artist Esther Kläs and Los Angeles-based sculptor Oscar Tuazon also created commissions for deCordova during the past year. Kläs’s Ferma(5) is composed of two granite slabs that evoke weathered, timeworn architectural ruins and stone-laid pathways. Resting on the earth and largely hidden from view, Ferma (5) is meant to be discovered amid the Sculpture Park’s forested grounds. Tuazon’s Partners comprises a concrete beam that extends up and over to connect with one of the Sculpture Park’s sugar maple trees, forming an architectural lintel between nature and culture.

Architectural Allusions also features two permanent collection works that embody Minimal and Conceptual sculptural concerns. Dan Graham’s Crazy Spheroid: Two Entrances, a two-way mirrored glass pavilion sculpture, was purchased for deCordova’s collection in 2009. While walking into and around the reflective half-ellipse structure, a viewer’s perception is disrupted, which establishes new relationships between one’s body and the surrounding landscape of the Sculpture Park. Sol LeWitt’s Tower (DC) recalls both stepped towers of ancient ziggurats and the repeating recession of the façade of modern skyscrapers. Previously on long-term loan to the institution, deCordova acquired Tower (DC) in honor of Boston gallerist Barbara Krakow, who was recognized at deCordova’s annual gala, just days ago.

There are two works on loan featured in Architectural Allusions: Polish artist Monika Sosnowksa’s monumental sculpture Tower, installed in May 2015, and Kenneth Snelson’s Wiggins Fork, which was added to the Sculpture Park last summer. Sosnowska’s sculpture is one of deCordova’s largest installations to date, measuring over 100 feet in length. Tower directly references the iconic architecture of Mies van der Rohe, specifically his Lake Shore Drive apartments in Chicago, Illinois. The sculpture is based on a portion of the building’s steel façade, which the artist has contorted into a cylindrical form. Tower poses questions about the mutable legacy of Modernist architecture and challenges distinctions between architecture and sculpture. Exhibited outdoors for the first time, Tower engages deCordova’s outdoor landscape along with other works in the Sculpture Park, such as Kenneth Snelson’s Wiggins Fork. Constructed with stainless steel rods and tension wires, the sculpture is engineered to appear light and effortless despite its strength in design. Since the 1960s, Snelson has been employing the technical forces of compression and tension to create structures that are composed of both flexible and rigid components.