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The Met’s annual sculpture commission for it’s rooftop garden is always one of the highlights of the spring and summer batch of new outdoor art projects sprouting up around NYC. This year’s installation, which opens Tuesday, April 17, is titled We Come In Peace and is the handiwork of Huma Bhabha, a Pakistani-American sculptor based in Poughkeepsie.
Known for totemic effigies evoking grotesque, mythological creatures, the artist has an abiding interest in science fiction, which seems especially pronounced in her latest work. The piece depicts what could be described as a first contact scenario featuring two statues. Things, however, don't seem to be going too well. There's a standing figure resembling the alien from Predator, and another lying prostrate before it. It's not clear whether the latter is human, since it has a tail and is cloaked in a shroud, but in any case, the ensemble appears on the Met rooftop as if it had just landed from outer space.
Like all of the Met’s rooftop commissions, Bhabha’s is set against the backdrop of New York’s skyline and Central Park. We Come In Peace will be waiting to be taken to your leader through October 28.
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