The Rosenquist Installation #1
(This is the first in a series of posts I’ll be writing to document the installation of The North Dakota Mural, the commissioned piece by James Rosenquist. Stage one? Replacing our atrium windows.)
What a difference 36 hours makes.
On Saturday night, the Museum was hopping with our 14th Annual Spring Gala. (It was a great evening, by the way, and the professional photos should be up soon. In the meantime, you can see some snaps on our Facebook page and at our Flickr stream.) Monday morning, I arrived at work to see this:
Atrium scaffolding from the first floor.
Atrium scaffolding from the second floor.
Atrium scaffolding from the third floor.
Yes, that’s three-plus stories of scaffolding. The purpose? To replace the window panels in the atrium roof. Back in 1997, when the Museum was moved to its current location, the atrium glass was installed without UV treatment. With the addition of a 13 x 24′ James Rosenquist mural to the atrium’s large north wall, however, it’s necessary to protect it from the sun’s rays. When the window replacement is complete, we’ll rest much easier knowing that this tremendous work of art will be enjoyed for generations to come.
The installation (and the scaffolding) will be up for the next three weeks. The galleries, The Store and Cafe Muse will all be open regular hours. We ask that any visitors please take extra care when walking around the scaffolding in case of falling tools or materials. However, please do stop by and see what’s going on (just don’t get any bright ideas about playing live action “Donkey Kong”) and, if you have any questions, just whistle.
We also thank you for your patience while we’re undergoing these improvements and hope you’ll share in our excitement with the final result – an incredible mural that will be a focal point for the visual arts in our community.
Looking forward to seeing the mural. Are there any pictures of what the finished piece will look like? I live out of the area, so I can’t stop in to see the progress. Thanks for the postings on facebook.
We plan on releasing a few details of the mural closer to the unveiling. I’m sure we’ll also put up some photos of the full mural once it’s up and hanging.
A while ago, we posted an update from the trip that our director Colleen took to visit the mural. You can see a little tiny bit of it behind her and James Rosenquist.