Organized by Boston-Based Guest Curator Pedro Alonzo, Trustees will Present Site-Specific, Contemporary, Art Installations by Renowned International Artists in 2016 and 2017

Summer 2016 Installations Will Be Presented by Sam Durant at the Old Manse in Concord and Jeppe Hein at World’s End in Hingham

The Trustees, Massachusetts’ largest conservation and preservation nonprofit, announces the launch of a two-year outdoor art initiative with installations by renowned artists Sam Durant and Jeppe Hein to open this summer at two of its cultural properties. The Trustees, whose 115 properties include some of Massachusetts’ most scenic and historic sites, such as the Old Manse in Concord, World’s End in Hingham and Castle Hill on the Crane Estate in Ipswich, is working with independent curator Pedro Alonzo to present the two-year art initiative, titled Art and The Landscape, aimed at enhancing and enriching visitor experience through site-specific outdoor art. The artists and sites for 2017 will be announced later this year.

Sam Durant: The Meeting House
In summer 2016, Los Angeles-based artist Sam Durant will install a site-specific, participatory installation at The Trustees’ Old Manse, located in Concord, Massachusetts. The Old Manse is a National Historic Landmark built in 1770 and former home and gathering place for politicians, thinkers, and transcendentalists including Ralph Waldo Emerson and Nathaniel Hawthorne. Durant, known for multimedia works that take a critical view on our social, political, and cultural tropes and often reference American history, will create a structure on-site in the North Field near Old Manse that will serve as a meeting place for the local and surrounding community to discuss and debate relevant issues of the day. The Meeting House, whose structure refers directly to homes of the first emancipated African men and women in Concord, seeks to offer a unique way to address difficult issues such as slavery and segregation and their continuing impact on today’s society. The structure will engage with the public during three lyceum events on August 13, September 24 and October 15, each with a different theme, and additional related programming events. The Old Manse is located next to the Old North Bridge and Minuteman National Historical Park in Concord, where the first revolutionary battle was fought, and will engage the more than two million combined visitors who visit the park each year.

Jeppe Hein: World's End Mirror Labyrinth
Berlin and Copenhagen-based artist, Jeppe Hein, will create a site-specific project at The Trustees’ World's End property in Hingham, Massachusetts this fall.  The artist’s work often combines elements of humor with the traditions of minimalism and conceptual art. For Art and The Landscape, Hein draws inspiration from the natural beauty and landscape at World's End, which features a combination of Frederick Law Olmsted-designed and natural landscapes with spectacular views of the Boston harbor and skyline. At World’s End, Hein will install a reflective labyrinth installation, made of mirrored posts of differing heights, whose structure mimics the shape of the surrounding drumlin formations. Visitors can walk through the labyrinth, touch the mirrored panels, and create their own photographic interpretations of “art and the landscape.”  The sculpture will be installed in August and will be on-site for a full year, allowing visitors to experience the transformation of the piece in different seasons. Trustees will host an opening reception with the artist on Sunday, September 18, 2016.
 
A public preview of the 2016 Art and The Landscape installations, entitled “Art in the Public Space” will take place Tuesday, June 7, 2016 at Le Laboratoire art and design center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Moderated by WGBH Arts Editor Jared Bowen, the conversation will explore how contemporary art outside of the museum and gallery world can provide a new perspective on the art and the respective landscape. Alonzo will present the Art and The Landscape initiative and discuss how the projects came about. Joining Alonzo will be curators and other experts. For more information, go to www.thetrustees.org/art.

Based in Boston and currently an adjunct curator at Dallas Contemporary, curator Pedro Alonzo specializes in producing exhibitions that transcend the boundaries of museum walls and spill out into the urban landscape.  Locally, he is best known for curating the giant black-and-white work by French artist JR, recently on display on the side of 200 Clarendon in Boston (formerly known as the John Hancock Tower).  Alonzo is also well-known locally for his Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA)/Boston exhibitions by Os Gêmeos (2012) including the first Rose Kennedy Greenway mural, Shepard Fairey: Supply and Demand (2009), and Dr. Lakra (2010). He served as an adjunct curator there from 2011–13.

“So many of our properties are known as spectacular visual experiences, offering stunning designed landscapes, scenic vistas, important cultural legacies and uncommon beauty,” says Barbara Erickson, Trustees President & CEO. “We are honored that Pedro is working with us to bring some of the world’s most esteemed artists to these amazing places to create new art for our visitors to encounter.  We hope these installations will create transformative experiences for our visitors – inspiring them to come visit one of our properties for the first time, or perhaps see it in a new light and gain a deeper appreciation of its significance.”
 
The artists were invited to visit sites selected by Alonzo and the Trustees in 2015 and create new works of art that embody the spirit of each place and help underscore why they matter. 
 
“Art and The Landscape embraces the selected sites’ incomparable attributes of stunning natural settings and rich history,” adds Alonzo. “The initiative provides artists with a unique opportunity to develop works conceived to directly engage audiences outside of the traditional art world circuit.”

Join the Art and The Landscape conversation with The Trustees on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram: @thetrustees #thetrustees #artXlandscape