unveiled new work that seems to distill that sense of optimism. With air travel limited and with many regions still under some form of lockdown, what could be more cheerfully forward-looking that a public art exhibition at an airport?, the organization that—in collaboration with LaGuardia Gateway Partners—commissioned the works. His work, continues Baume, “solicits a sense of wonder, and delight, and joy; and, of course, those are all things we desperately need in our lives right now.
It’s important, says the artist, that his work allows each viewer to “embrace their sense of wonder; offer them new perspectives on [themselves], each other, and the spaces we have in common; and create the conditions that foster moments of joy, empathy, and fellowship. I think this is important for New York now and in the future, as for all places where people live.”Today I Feel More Like...,
Photo: James Ewing, Courtesy Public Art Fund, NY. Courtesy of König Galerie, Berlin; 303 Gallery, New York; and GalleriNicolai Wallner, CopenhagenMany years years ago, I started to do interactive works where people somehow became the artwork. It quite often happens that you start to interact with [my works] just because you’re just close to them. You mirror yourself, or you look into the mirror and you see someone else and you get shy because you don’t want to have eye contact with someone.
I started with the balloons 15 years ago. You can give a balloon to a friend, or make it a present to a kid, or whatever. It can have so many meanings, [like with] weddings and parties and so on, but it’s a lot to do with love as well. Sometimes you see a balloon flying away when someone has lost it.
Hope2020