Central Park looks a bit odd these days.
There is a 1930s Icelandic fishing boat sailing in the Harlem Meer, with a sextet on board playing live music.
There are actors re-creating movie scenes.
There is a solar ice cream truck giving away cones colored like the Central Park sunset.
These are some of the eight free, participatory artworks opening on Friday in the northern part of the park. Creative Time's exhibit "Drifting in Daylight" includes works by artists Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Spencer Finch, Alicia Framis, Nina Katchadourian, Ragnar Kjartansson, David Levine, Karyn Olivier and Lauri Stallings.
Six of the works have been created for the project, and most are inspired by the history of the park, marking Central Park Conservancy’s 35th anniversary.
Anne Pasternak, president and artistic director of Creative Time, said the exhibit is more “dreamy” than other works they have presented, like Kara Walker's installation at the Domino Sugar factory last year — but she says there is politics here, too.
“Just coming together in moments of civicness that get us to reflect and use our public spaces as places to enact democracy as well as dreams, is inherently an extremely important experience today,” she said.
Contemporary racial politics inspires one of the pieces. "Black Joy in the Hour of Chaos" features eight African-American performers wearing red hoodies and reflecting on issues like the recent deaths of black men at the hands of the police.
Artist Marc Bamuthi Joseph said he wants the piece to create a counter-narrative to the dire tone of the current conversation. “Think in terms of joy and the living black body, how that matters, too,” he said.
The pieces are joyful, and fun. And they show that the true spectacle here is Central Park. They will be performed Fridays and Saturdays, from noon to 6 p.m. until June 20h.
