The NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale will unveil the recently acquired documentation of Christo and Jeanne-Claude’s “Surrounded Islands” in a new exhibition on Feb. 23.
Bonnie Clearwater, director of the museum, said the exhibition will include images, scraps of fabric, permits, legal documentation, maps and more.
“We did this exhibit to create a visual for our visitors of what it must have been like to see the original art,” Clearwater said.
In 1983, Christo and Jeanne-Claude completed their “Surrounded Islands” project, which consisted of completely surrounding 11 islands in Bakers Haulover Cut with a vibrant pink cloth. The fabric remained for two weeks before being removed.
This installation took three years to complete, with around 400 paid workers. Christo and Jeanne-Claude personally financed the project by creating and selling art, Clearwater said.
“This project really put Miami on the map internationally, not just the art map, but the map as a place of culture and innovation and excitement. And the press it generated was just tremendous,” Clearwater said.
Before this piece, Clearwater said South Florida had been considered a plain, flat landscape — nothing particularly beautiful about it. However, once the project was completed, people began traveling from all over to catch a glimpse of the islands, she said.
“It ties in with the American tradition of the landscape sublime, the big, beautiful paintings from the 19th century of the glorious landscapes and Niagara Falls and sunsets, all of this was part of the American experience,” Clearwater said.
All the documentation for the project has been permanently donated to the art museum. Along with the physical remnants of the project, the museum will also have a station where visitors can record their own experiences with the piece to create an “oral history.”
“Everyone seems to have a Christo story or a Surrounded Islands story so we will have a kiosk where someone can walk up and make your own Christo history,” Clearwater said.
In an effort to connect with the younger generation, the museum has been working in collaboration with Kolos Schumy, assistant professor in the Department of Communication, Media, and the Arts. He has virtually surrounded the museum with pink sharks, the same color of the pink fabric. Visitors will be able to view this by scanning a QR code displayed at the exhibit.
“I think these colorful, playful things just go straight into the brain of these younger people. We also have a large shark attacking the hotel across the street,” Schumy said.
All NSU students automatically have a membership to the museum. They just need to activate it on the museum website using their NSU login information. Clearwater urges all students to attend the exhibition, not just art students.
She said that the exhibition is multidisciplinary since there are extensive documents on the wildlife living on the island, legal documents from different agencies trying to stop Christo and Jeanne-Claude, papers containing information about the marine life and ecosystems around the islands, as well as the beauty of the piece itself.
“I think students should come to see it for multiple reasons, but first of all it, was beautiful. The opening quote for the exhibition is from Christo and it says, ‘above everything, it was beautiful,’” Clearwater said.
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