Mike + Doug Starn’s Big Bambú Open to the Public

This courtesy of FITZ & CO
Dan Tanzilli / Bethanie Brady

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Mike + Doug Starn
Allowing Inside View of the Creation of
Big Bambú,
A Colossal Sculpture composed of
Bamboo Poles, Rock Climbers, Rope and Time
Visitors Can Experience Big Bambú in the studio
Three days this summer
From 11AM to 4PM on July 25, and August 8 + 22
Admission Free and Open to Public
New York, July 16, 2009 — Big Bambú is an ever growing and changing sculpture by Mike and Doug Starn constructed from thousands of fresh-cut bamboo poles lashed together by a team of rock climbers working as high as fifty feet off the ground under the artists' direction.

The Starns decided to open their studio for a few occasions this summer upon receiving numerous requests after images and videos of the sculpture were premiered at The Armory Show in March.

The sculpture is never at rest, always complete, but always unfinished. The artwork began as a few pieces of bamboo tied together, growing quickly as thousands of 30-40' long poles are added to create a huge mass, a strong and complex network that currently measures more than 120-feet long. At its pinnacle, the sculpture cantilevers out as far as the bamboo pole network allows, and then bridges back down to the floor forming an arch. Currently, the first tower is being dismantled pole by pole and carried through the structure and down and begins creating a new tower, continually "walking" down the 320-foot space, like an organism, and then back again.

Big Bambú is like a wave constantly in motion - a metaphor of our personal as well as our collective growth and change through the course of time yet remaining invariable, constant and unchanged.

Last summer, the artists set out to find a space where they could take on this experiment. In Beacon, NY, near the Dia Art Foundation, the artists discovered the old Tallix Foundry, a cavernous space the length of a football field with 50' high ceilings. The artists assembled a team of local rock climbers to work within the sculpture, directing them as they lash together essentially a massive line drawing in three dimensions in an ongoing action as they continually re-build the giant webbed network, while visitors below can watch the creation of the sculpture. The sculpture relays a sense of joy, optimism and awe. Return visitors can experience the excitement of seeing Big Bambú morph with each passing week.

Big Bambú visuals on the Starn Studio website (www.starnstudio.com) will be regularly updated, showing the continuous evolution of the artwork and its evolving incarnations. You can also become a fan of Big Bambú at: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Beacon-NY/Big-Bambu/69823518075?sid=afdd94cdb6

Doug and Mike Starn will open their Beacon, New York studio to visitors to experience the performative work as they experiment with and explore the opportunities and limitations of the bamboo structure. The dates and times for visiting Big Bambú are:

July 25
August 8 and 22
From 11:00AM to 4:00PM
Admission is free and open to the public of all ages.
Directions to the studio can be found on:
www.starnstudio.com
Doug and Mike Starn, American artists, born New Jersey 1961. Identical twins, they work collaboratively and their conceptual photo-based artworks has earned them a unique position in the history of contemporary art starting with the 1987 Whitney Museum of American Art Biennial, which brought them international prominence. They continue defying categorization, effectively combining traditionally separate disciplines such as sculpture, painting, video, and installation. Their art has been the object of numerous survey solo exhibitions in museums and galleries worldwide.

Mike and Doug Starn recently completed See It Split, See It Change, a multi-part, site-specific installation that encompasses the entire interior of the new South Ferry Terminal concourse, as part of the MTA Arts for Transit Permanent Art Program.

The Starns have received critical acclaim in The New York Times Magazine, Art in America, Artforum, and, Flash Art. Major artworks are represented in public and private collections such as: La Bibliotèque Nationale, MoMA, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Jewish Museum, La Maison Européenne de la Photographie, LACMA, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Victoria, SFMOMA, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Yokohama Museum of Art, amongst many others.

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Press Contact
FITZ & CO
Dan Tanzilli / Bethanie Brady
212.627.1455 Ext. 226/ 212.627.1455 Ext. 232
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