Last month, the board of Storm King Art Center in New Windsor, New York, announced that it had appointed Nora Lawrence as the institution’s first executive director. Founded in 1960, the sculpture park holds a unique place in the New York art world. It is a monument to the radical work of post-war artists who needed the outdoors to make large-scale works and a living cultural platform that still programs relevant exhibitions by the artists of today who have ambitions of a similar scale. We caught up with Lawrence to hear about her own ambitions and where Storm King is headed.
You come to the executive director position with over a decade’s tenure at Storm King, having served as artistic director and chief curator. What have you learned about the institution in that time?
Storm King is unlike anywhere else in the world. We have an incredible 500-acre landscape that was created with art at the forefront and to which many artists have contributed throughout its history.
The perspectives of artists are always changing, and we’re proud to be an institution that centers our artists’ voices and ideas. We see a lot of artists who find themselves inspired by our region and its history or particular aspects of the landscape. It is through their process of research and discovery that I’m often making new connections or seeing things in a different light. We’re also consistently commissioning new works—both temporary and permanent—and find that in asking artists to create something that pushes the boundaries of their practice, we as an institution evolve. Quite literally, it has been artists who have made our landscape for art the size it is, always pushing figurative as well as literal boundaries. When Richard Serra created Schunnemunk Fork, he sited it in a field that was never intended for art. Andy Goldsworthy sited his work in a forest just to the south of that, and of course, Maya Lin created Storm King’s first land artwork from a large plot of land that had been mined for stone that was used for the New York State Thruway nearby.
What are some of your favorite Storm King shows that you’ve worked on?
Two that come to mind immediately are Sarah Sze’s Fallen Sky and Martin Puryear’s Lookout. It’s a privilege to work with an artist on a new project from beginning to end, and with both of these commissions, I was able to work with the artists as they pushed their practices in entirely new directions.
In creating Fallen Sky, Sarah Sze really embraced the landscape as an active participant and even as an extension of the artwork. Its mirrored surfaces always reflect a different perspective or moment in time. Martin Puryear’s Lookout was a feat of engineering and his first foray into an entirely new material: brick. It’s the only sculpture of Martin’s that people can enter, and it has become a beacon for visitors.
Upstate New York became an ever hotter destination following the pandemic. Heaven help us, soon there will be a Soho House up there. How has this increased popularity for the region affected Storm King?
I have a deep and lifelong love for the Hudson Valley and am not surprised to see that people have been gravitating toward everything that the region has to offer. The Hudson Valley is also a place where many artists live, work and come to recharge. Storm King was founded in 1960, and over that time, it has played a major role in shaping the cultural landscape of the Hudson Valley. We’ve always seen the vast potential for inspiration, creativity and community here, and we’re excited that our audiences are growing along with interest in the area.
This past fall’s show by Arlene Shechet earned praise from many quarters, with Ariella Budick in the Financial Times writing that, “In its multi-layered complexity and vulnerability, each piece is one of us.” What goes into a successful temporary exhibition at Storm King?
Any artist who shows at Storm King does so, in part, to explore a previously untapped element of their practice or to push the boundaries of their work in a new way. In Arlene’s case, that manifested in both scale and materiality, resulting in an incredibly ambitious installation. Another example that comes to mind is Lynda Benglis’ 2015 exhibition Water Sources. That show brought together all of her fountain works alongside other works that relate to water, which had never before been seen together. Both of these presentations could have only happened at Storm King.
In May, you will unveil Storm King’s $53M capital project. That’s a chunk of change! Where will those efforts be directed?
We are so excited to welcome visitors back this spring. The vision to offer a more seamless and engaging experience for visitors and create more space for artwork gave rise to much of the work that’s been done. We have been able to reclaim five acres of former parking lots for landscape and artistic programming. Visitors will see this in the spring as it will be the site for a new installation of Kevin Beasley’s work–his largest to date.
Come May, we’ll be welcoming visitors in a whole new way. Whether people arrive by car, bus or rideshare, they’ll gather in a new outdoor lobby flanked by elegant pavilions for ticketing, restrooms and group orientation and populated by native plants and trees. It’s an open-air space for visitors to get their bearings before entering Storm King.
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We’ve also built a dedicated structure for conservation, fabrication and maintenance. It’s in a non-public area of the site, but visitors will share in its impact as it allows us to fabricate new exhibitions and perform necessary conservation work on the collection. The building is the first of its kind for Storm King, and there are very few like it in the world. We are very fortunate and proud to have something that supports our work with artists in such a rich way.
All of this was realized through an incredible design team we’ve been working with for many years, led by Heneghan Peng Architects, WXY Studio and Reed Hilderbrand. This is Heneghan Peng’s first major project in the U.S. (they have an incredible portfolio of civic and cultural work across the globe), which is especially exciting as we near the opening. We worked with the architects and landscape architects as equal partners, which is unusual for many museum capital projects but critical, of course, for Storm King.
I have to ask about “Brat Autumn.” Why did your team approach Charli XCX about that? Can we expect future Brat seasons or similar programming?
Storm King is innately a place for gathering and deep enjoyment of the natural world, and it was actually Charli who approached us. From the outset of the partnership, it felt very natural. Storm King has a long history of hosting and commissioning performances, and they are often in conversation with the surrounding sculptures–as Charli’s was. It was important to us that the activation felt cohesive within our mission and vision, and we were excited to find a spot for the set that was surrounded by artworks by important female artists: Maya Lin, Alicja Kwade, Alice Aycock and Arlene Shechet.
As for future Brat seasons, we’re always excited about collaborations that encourage us and our visitors to see Storm King in new and unexpected ways.
How do you keep the permanent collection feeling fresh for repeat visitors?
A visit to Storm King is truly always different. Seasonal changes and environmental elements, such as the position of the sun, clouds, wind, etc., frame a visitor’s experience. Artists consider this in the creation of their works, and it is evident in their choice of materials and where the works are sited. Temporary exhibitions and performances also create new juxtapositions and pairings between artworks. People will often come to me after seeing a new installation by an emerging artist or attending a concert to say how it changed their perspective on the other works that they saw.
