Brooklyn-based Chilean artist Iván Navarro recently lit up New York's Madison Square Park with his installation This Land Is Your Land. Consisting of three water towers, the installation transforms a staple of New York's skyline into something just a few feet away. The towers sit at a height above viewers' heads, allowing them to pass through underneath and marvel at the mirrors and neon lights above.
"I like the idea of a reservoir of water. This simple and timeless wooden structure contains water—the most primitive and elemental resource, the essence of human sustenance, and a reminder of the basic condition that all humanity shares," Navarro explained in a press release.
Inside the towers, Navarro has embedded neon lights, which out spell words like "me," "we," and "bed." Navarro has also inserted mirrors throughout the towers' interiors to create the illusion of an endless vertical space. While the words Navarro has chosen to depict may be meaningless to some people, they're meant to resonate with those who have immigrated to the United States. Appropriately named after Woody Guthrie's patriotic folk song, the installation is Navarro's commentary on the various freedoms this country has offered its citizens.
"While wood water tanks are a ubiquitous sight on New York City's rooftops, the artist loads them with substantive content demonstrating how sculpture can function as object and as a messenger of critical issues today," Brooke Kamin Rapaport, who is the senior curator of the Madison Square Park Conservancy, said in a statement.
Navarro's This Land Is Your Land will be on view in Manhattan's Madison Square Park until April 13, 2014.
