New York, NY (March 19, 2012) – High Line Art, presented by Friends of the High Line, is pleased to announce Lilliput, the first group exhibition at the High Line. Lilliput will make its debut on Thursday, April 19, 2012, and remain on view through Sunday, April 14, 2013. Lilliput will reflect on the traditional role of public art by offering a counterbalance to the monumental scale often employed for plaza sculptures and other outdoor installations in public spaces. As the first project in the HIGH LINE COMMISSIONS series for spr... Read more

New York, NY (March 19, 2012) – High Line Art, presented by Friends of the High Line, is pleased to announce Lilliput, the first group exhibition at the High Line. Lilliput will make its debut on Thursday, April 19, 2012, and remain on view through Sunday, April 14, 2013.
Lilliput will reflect on the traditional role of public art by offering a counterbalance to the monumental scale often employed for plaza sculptures and other outdoor installations in public spaces. As the first project in the HIGH LINE COMMISSIONS series for spring, 2012, Lilliput will feature miniature sculptures installed in unusual and unexpected places at the High Line – amongst the vegetation and along the pathway – to create an art treasure hunt for visitors. Lilliput takes its title from Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels, conjuring a magical world populated by fairy tale creatures, mysterious idols, and dreamlike landscapes.
Lilliput will feature installations by six artists from around the globe:
Born in Austria and based in Berlin, Oliver Laric (b. 1981) presents Sun Tzu Janus, a colorful resin cast of Sun Tzu, the legendary author of The Art of War, a book about military strategy that has recently been adopted in other fields as an inspiration on how to succeed in highly competitive situations. Inspired by the recent public obsession with Sun Tzu, Laric will cast one of Sun Tzu’s busts as a two-faced idol reminiscent of Janus, the Roman two-faced god who looks back at the past and into the future, thus hybridizing Eastern and Western cultures.
Born in Italy and based in Los Angeles, Alessandro Pessoli (b. 1963) has been making sculptural works that reference the production of traditional Italian ceramics. For this exhibition, Pessoli will explore the materials of bronze and steel to create Old Singer with Blossoms, a 9-foot-tall sculpture of a mysterious figure resembling a lonely scarecrow. Half human and half stylized, the figure will be installed among the birch trees and old freight train tracks embedded in the planting beds near the southern end of the High Line, standing out amidst the densely-planted vegetation as an oversized deity of a forgotten past.
Japanese artist Tomoaki Suzuki (b. 1972) is known for small wooden figurative sculptures depicting real people with distinct urban style. For Lilliput, Suzuki will present his first outdoor sculpture, Carson, a young man wearing a black leather jacket and tight pants. Usually one-third of human scale, Suzuki’s sculptures update the traditional technique of wood carving to a contemporary multicultural style.
Working at the intersection of sculpture and installation, New Zealand-born, UK-based artist Francis Upritchard (b.1976) crafts a world populated by miniatures idols, eerie creatures, and fantastical animals. Upritchard’s new work, titled The Seduction, is a bronze sculpture of two small monkeys frozen in an embrace.
Brazilian artist Erika Verzutti (b. 1971) has been experimenting with sculpture by combining abstract modernist shapes with natural forms such as vegetables and animals. On the High Line, Verzutti will present Dino Abacate, Dino Tropical, Dino Pot, and Dino, a family of dinosaurs installed within the sumac and magnolia trees below the Falcone Flyover, the elevated pathway on the High Line between West 25th and West 27th Streets. The sculptures will evoke a prehistoric site populated by primordial creatures.
New York-based artist Allyson Vieira (b. 1979) is known for large-scale installations feature casts of body parts and common objects. For Lilliput, Vieira will present Construction (Rampart), a bronze cast of a paper cup pyramid. As it ages over the course of the 12-month exhibition, the sculpture will collect plant debris and water, transforming into an urban relic and evoking the past trajectory of the High Line itself.
“I am looking forward to seeing multiple artworks spread along the High Line for the first time, in the context of this group show,” said Cecilia Alemani, the Donald R. Mullen, Jr. Curator and Director of High Line Art at Friends of the High Line. “Throughout the different seasons, nature will embrace the sculptures, transforming their surroundings and acting as a backdrop in continuous flux. It will be exciting to see how the artworks merge and blend with the High Line’s landscape over the course of the next year.”