Large-scale sculpture works by artists from under-represented backgrounds are coming back to the US Open for the third consecutive year as the popular Armory Off-Site at the US Open returns to the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.
The sculptures will be installed for US Open Fan Week, which features free grounds admission and runs from Aug. 19-25, and will remain on view through the end of the tournament on Sept. 8. Launched in 2022 as part of the USTA’s 'Be Open' social impact campaign, the Armory Off-Site at the US Open collaboration is grounded in the USTA’s and The Armory Show’s shared vision for creativity, inspiration and equity.
Armory Off-Site is The Armory Show's New York City-wide public art program that presents large-scale artworks and performances across the city, and will present artwork by Taiwanese-Canadian artist An Te Liu (Blouin Division); Brooklyn-based Tomokazu Matsuyama (Kavi Gupta); New York-based trans artist Eva Robarts (Ruttkowski;68); and Claudia Peña Salinas (Embajada) at the US Open.
The pieces range from bronze and stainelss steel sculptures by Liu and Matsuyama, respectively, to Robarts' piece composed of a chain-link gate and tennis balls, and a sculpture or brass and river rocks from Peña Salinas' travels to Mexico.
Learn more about this year's installation below.
An Te Liu, Venus Redux (2018)
- Presented by Blouin Division (Montreal)
- Bronze
- 48 x 42 x 36 in.
Venus Redux embodies conceptions of strength and beauty. Its posture and forms are a re-mix of the Lely Venus held in the British Museum, which was in turn modeled after a famed crouching Venus from the Hellenistic period. Here, the enduring power and poise of the original is presented anew, in a visceral amalgam of force and grace.
Eva Robarts, Fantasy of Happiness (2022)
- Presented by Ruttkowski;68 (Cologne, Düsseldorf, New York, Paris)
- Chain link gate and tennis balls
- 3 x 2 x 0.5 ft.
Robarts, a New York-based mixed media artist, includes found materials into a conceptual framework in a web of memory, history and cultural forces. The discarded tennis balls are caught within the chain-link fence of a reclaimed gate that evokes a certain nostalgia in palette and ghost of past activity.
Tomokazu Matsuyama, Runner (2021)
- Presented by Kavi Gupta (Chicago)
- Stainless steel
- 96 x 36 x 36 in.
Matsuyama’s 2022 solo exhibition at Kavi Gupta gallery in Chicago. The form is highly abstracted, offering not so much a narrative expression of a runner, but rather a poetic incarnation of certain ideas about the function and cultural meaning of running as part of human culture. Viewed from certain angles, the sculpture reveals aspects of a human form, such as a head, arms and feet that don a pair of athletic shoes. Other aspects of the form are intended to convey movement and action. Matsuyama’s sculptural practice is informed by his process of questioning how his imagery might be experienced by viewers in three-dimensional space. He contemplates the total optical experience of his paintings and the logical relationships of the formal elements within them, creating mirrored forms and patterns that serve as an optical metaphor for his vision of cultural exchange and influence. The effect event extends beyond the piece, as its surfaces will take on the colors of its environment.
Claudia Peña Salinas, Tetl Mirror I (2024)
- Presented by Embajada (San Juan)
- Brass and river rocks 77 x 48 in.
Peña Salinas’ practice combines sculpture, images, installation, and video to draw connection between the indigenous and the modern. Her ongoing body of work explores Aztec and Mayan mythology to construct poetic narratives. The artist's multimedia practice is based on her travels throughout Mexico researching sites related to Mesoamerican deities and collecting rocks from neighboring rivers and found objects that are incorporated into her sculpture. The resulting series, which includes Tetl Mirror I—"Tetl" means "rock" in the Aztec language, Nahuatl—unites ancestral beliefs with modern and minimalist lines.
