MILAN – If New York is your destination of choice for this summer’s holiday, you will of course visit Times Square, a panoramic icon with lots to offer. For example, in the hall of the Viacom Palace you will find “Wild Efflux”, the three-dimensional sculpture by artist Crystal Wagner, who works primarily with plastic. This extremely bold sculptural installation is 117-feet long, and is on show in the palace lobby next to the escalator.
What are the work’s features?
It was created using synthetic materials, with the huge installation made out of sheets of plastic. Wagner imagines her sculptures as the product of some far-off future where “plastic grows by itself”. The work is 117-feet long and 30-feet tall. Wagner’s creation took her and a team of 100 volunteers 10 days to construct. The artist hopes to evoke the same sense of wonder you would feel standing under a waterfall. By crafting organic-seeming forms from synthetic materials, Wagner's work explores our disconnection from the natural world in an age where we engage more with our computer screens than with real life.
The structure of the work according to Wagner’s rules
Wagner starts work with a natural point of reference, enabling forms to emerge and multiply. Wild Efflux cascades over the walls in a dream-like way, pulling the Viacom Palace hall in and integrating it into the work. Wagner is an interdisciplinary contemporary artist. Her passion is three-dimensional forms, which she creates using unconventional materials that are then shaped into large-scale installations. Her piece replaces “Flowers 2015: Outside In”, a romantic floral work by the English artist Rebecca Louise Law.
