If you've never found yourself fully immersed in a room full of balloons, then hurry to Gavin Brown's Enterprise in New York City's Lower East Side. Martin Creed art has moved in with his fun-loving installation WORK NO. 2592. Filling the gallery with red balloons that reach above most people's heads, the installation is available for experiencing for one week only. The final day is today (December 19, 2015).
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"WORK NO. 2592" by Martin Creed installed at Gavin Brown's Enterprise. Image courtesy of Gavin Brown's Enterprise.
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Martin Creed's Red Balloons. Posted by istillheartnewyork on Instagram.
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Martin Creed's Red Balloons. Posted by mugglinstagram on Instagram.
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Crowds have been taking advantage of the art installation to have fun and get silly. Instagram is filled with images of people enjoying movable balloons in the installation created by Martin Creed, a British conceptual artist and 2001 Turner Prize winner. If Instagram is any indication, people of all ages are getting into art... literally.
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Martin Creed's Red Balloons. Posted by chelseaoutloud on Instagram.
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Martin Creed's Red Balloons. Posted by christopher.gooden on Instagram.
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Martin Creed’s room-filled balloon installations have appeared in museums and galleries worldwide. The artist's aim of the work is to allow visitors to experience what the volume of air feels like.
I was lucky enough to experience this myself a few years ago. The Aldrich Art Museum in Connecticut featured Turner's art in 2013 set in four rooms. I found Work. No. 216, Be natural (1998–99) installed in at room at the end of a long hallway with a guard positioned outside. After removing from my pockets and person all sharp objects, cell phones, jewelry with edges and any other items that might harm the installation, the door was opened, balloons spilled out into the hall and I waded into the pool of gold bouncy air-filled objects.
Being surrounded on all sides (including over my head) by balloons was disconcerting, at first. Once I became acclimated to my new environment, exploring the ways the balloon atmosphere could move was fun. It felt like being inside a pool of water but with lots of moving parts and breathing didn't special apparatus. You could part the balloons to find the surface and the world above. Balloons could be isolated and areas carved out where balloons could be kept at bay...for at time.
Noticing how static electricity felt on a grand scale added intrigue. Hair everywhere wanted to stand on edge and sometimes did. I wondered if I was paying enough attention to the point of the piece and then decided to enjoy and worry about that later. It was too much fun being in a balloon world. Experiencing joy without qualification in a participatory art work was worth the trip. Catch the experience at Gavin Brown's Enterprise, if you can. If not, joy can be felt from the pictures of people who were happy to share on social media.
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Martin Creed's Red Balloons. Posted by gareth_hughes28 on Instagram.
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Martin Creed's Red Balloons. Posted by emily_cheng513 on Instagram.
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Martin Creed's Red Balloons. Posted by katyhamer on Instagram.
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To see more pictures of people on Instagram enjoying Martin Creed installation, search the hashtag #martincreed or click here.
Interested in other Martin Creed balloon installations? Click here to see Work No. 360: Half the air in a given space at the Henry Art Gallery in Seattle or installed at Galerie Analix B & L Polla, Geneva, Switzerland (1998). His balloon installations have also been exhibited at Tate St Ives, MARCO, the Cleveland Museum of Art and more. Watch a YouTube of the installation and interview with Creed at the Nasher Sculpture Center by clicking here.
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BASIC FACTS: WORK NO. 2592 by Martin Creed is exhibited at Gavin Brown's Enterprise from December 12 - 19, 2015. The gallery is located at 291 Grand Street, New York, NY 10002. Next up at the gallery is a solo show by Dirk Bell. The show opens on December 31, 2015 and runs through January 31, 2016. www.gavinbrown.biz.
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