Derrick Adams at the National Mall. KAWS: Holiday in Indonesia

Derrick Adams is one of six artists who was invited to create works for a special outdoor exhibit at the National Mall in D.C.

 

The idea for the exhibition Beyond Granite: Pulling Together was inspired by an extraordinary event that occurred on Easter Sunday in 1939. Singer Marian Anderson was banned from singing at Constitution Hall, where Black performers were prohibited. The hall was owned by the Daughters of the American Revolution. 

 

A special performance was arranged for Anderson to sing in front of the Lincoln Memorial. An audience of 75,000 showed up to hear and support her. For the current exhibit, the artists were asked, “What stories remain untold on the National Mall?”

 

 

Adams, whose work focuses joy, humor and relaxation in Black communities, answered that question by creating America’s Playground: DC. He built a fully operational playground, divided by a billboard that features a photo of all-white Edgewood Park in D.C. just days after the 1954 Supreme Court ruling that declared the segregation of DC’s schools—and by extension its playgrounds— unconstitutional. 

 

Derrick Adams would like his work to be used and enjoyed as a playground, and also as place to remember  and contemplate its history. America’s Playground: DC will be on view at the National Mall through September 18, 2023.

 

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 An ancient Hindu temple complex in Indonesia is the tenth stop on the KAWS:Holiday tour. For this stop KAWS Accomplice character is resting in Prambanan, a 9th century Hindu temple complex. The area is one of UNESCO’s World Heritage Sites.

 

The KAWS:Holiday tour began in Seoul in 2018 and has traveled to Taipei, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Bristol, Singapore, Changbai Mountain and Melbourne. 

 

On this ancient site, in southern Java, rests the148-foot Accomplice, KAWS’ largest sculpture to date. The KAWS:Holiday Indonesia edition will be on view at the Prambanan Temple from August 19 – 31 2023.

 

 

 

 

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 Roy Lichtenstein (1923-1997) was born on October 27, 1923. To celebrate the 100th year of the great artist’s birth, the Roy Lichtenstein Foundation is donating paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures, reference materials and archival films to museums in the United States and abroad. 

 

The celebration was kicked off earlier this year, in April, when the United States Postal Service issued a set of commemorative Roy Lichtenstein Stamps.

 

Many of Lichtenstein’s large, colorful sculptures have been on exhibit in major museums and public venues around the world for decades. Their care and preservation is the subject of a new book by Julie Wolfe, conservator of decorative arts and sculpture at the J. Paul Getty Museum. Roy Lichtenstein: Outdoor Painted Sculpture discusses the materials and processes that Lichtenstein used and how best to keep the sculptures looking bright and beautiful, as the artist intended.

 

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August 24, 2023