Adding to its collection of museum-quality art, NorthPark Center opens “This Land Is Your Land” on Wednesday, featuring three wooden water towers that serve as metaphors for the immigration experience.
Brooklyn-based Chilean artist Iván Navarro created the exhibition, which recently was shown in Madison Square Park in New York City, before making its way to our neighborhood.
You can find the installation on Level One between Neiman Marcus and Nordstrom.
Each of Navarro’s sculptures contains a different neon word or image inside, which visitors can see by walking underneath the towers. Navarro says in his artist statement:
“I like the idea of a reservoir of water. This simple and timeless wooden structure contains water—the most primitive and elemental resource, the essence of human sustenance, and a reminder of the basic condition that all humanity shares. We must guarantee our water in order to survive. In that sense the water tanks are containers of primordial knowledge. Their form and material are equally archaic: they are simple circular huts with conical roofs, made of wood. Across America, the water towers form changes – some top large buildings metaphorically functioning as tall ornamental crowns, others loom above towns like watchtowers due to their elevated position. By positioning This Land is Your Land in NorthPark Center, the viewer is both reminded of this outdoor structure that helps sustain their communities, and is transported within the shopping mall. Upon walking under the sculpture, the viewer is presented with a temporary visual reality. In a similar manner, shopping malls provide a contained experiential environment outside of daily life.”
