Sarah Oppenheimer, S-399390, 2016. Commission for Mudam, Luxenbourg. Photo by Serge Hasenböhler
Landmarks announced today the commission of a major new work by Sarah Oppenheimer. The artist creates precise forms that alter the built environment and shift our frames of spatial reference. The commission, titled C-010106, comprises a pair of dynamic apertures inserted into a pedestrian footbridge. Glass volumes transect the bridge’s surface, creating new sightlines that generate unexpected social exchange, displace our experience of inside and out, and invert our sense of what is near and far. C-010106 will be unveiled this fall and was recently announced as the recipient of a $20,000 NEA grant.
This commission marks Oppenheimer’s first entirely outdoor public work and is among the artist’s largest to date. The work is sited on the footbridge connecting the Cockrell School's Engineering Education and Research Center (EERC) to the new Gary L. Thomas Energy Engineering Building (GLT), both designed by Ennead Architects with Jacobs. C-010106 consists of a pair of voids bounded by four panes of glass: two sloped planes are sandwiched between two vertical sheets. By precisely orienting the glass through an incision in the bridge’s surface, the work produces intimate and unexpected views between the footbridge occupants and the pathway beneath. Reflected and refracted sightlines transform the inhabitants’ navigation of place, intermingling unexpected social encounters with a heightened awareness of the shared environment.
“We’re working with an inventor who questions everything,” said Andrée Bober, Landmarks founding director and curator. “Oppenheimer draws scientists and engineers into a journey that is driven by curiosity. I can’t think of a more apt place for this work than the center of innovation and discovery at the Cockrell School of Engineering.”
“C-010106 is a catalyst: it reconfigures social patterns emerging within the flux of public place. I am eager to see the piece animated by intimate exchanges passing through and around its contours,” Oppenheimer said.
Landmarks is one of the foremost public art programs at an American university. It launched in 2008 with a long-term loan of 28 sculptures from The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Displayed across UT Austin’s 433-acre campus are works by Beverly Pepper, Tony Smith and Ursula von Rydingsvard, among others. Building upon this foundation and supported by a percent-for-art program, Landmarks has acquired or commissioned 18 works by artists including Michael Ray Charles, Ann Hamilton, José Parlá, Nancy Rubins and James Turrell. The collection and related public programs expand opportunities for equitable engagement with art.
“Sarah has developed an extremely thoughtful concept that challenges our perceptions and uses materials in an innovative manner,” said Sharon L. Wood, dean of the Cockrell School. “The fusion of art and engineering creates an exciting opportunity for our community, and I believe C-010106 will inspire future generations of Texas Engineering students to think creatively about technical challenges.”
About Sarah Oppenheimer
Sarah Oppenheimer (b. 1972, Austin, Texas; lives and works in New York City) received a B.A. from Brown University in 1995 and an MFA from Yale University in 1999. Her work has been featured in solo exhibitions at Kunstmuseum Thun, Switzerland (2020); MASS MoCA, North Adams, Massachusetts (2019); the Wexner Center for the Arts, Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio (2017); the Pérez Art Museum Miami, Florida (2016); MUDAM: Musée d’Art Moderne Grand-Duc Jean, Luxembourg (2016); and Kunsthaus Baselland, Muttenz, Switzerland (2014). She is a recipient of the Rome Prize Fellowship (2011–12), Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Fellowship (2009), and Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship (2007). Oppenheimer is currently a senior critic at the Yale University School of Art. On August 28, 2021, the solo museum exhibition Sarah Oppenheimer: Sensitive Machine will open at the Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art at Hamilton College.
