Through October 25th, the busy Place Vendome, ground zero for Parisian fashion boutiques, will feature two new works by American sculptor Dan Graham, whose architectural installations employ partially mirrored surfaces and refraction to juxtapose viewers with their surrounds and one-another. Two Nodes (2015) features two mirrored cylinders that mix reflectivity with transparency to create a constantly shifting environment that distorts bodies, and overlaps images. In an adjacent outdoor work, Passage Intime (2015), Graham invites users to traverse a narrow passageway, which also provides shape-shifting reflections to viewers, as well as draws narrow boundaries of shared public space.
Graham cites bus shelters and telephone booths as environments he experienced in U.S. cities as inspiration for the works, which he adds also owe a debt to those distinctly Parisian urban passageways that date back to the 1800s, where strangers brush arms and separate lives intersect, if only for a moment.
The two public artworks, which are presented by the international Marian Goodman Gallery, are part of an Hors Les Murs program, a national center for street art and circus art. For more info.