The Critic: more stuff about Tom Otterness

by Mungo Baguette

Mom comes home late alot, and she often ends up at the 14th St. A train station stop for hours. This is because in Giuliani's New York, people who ride the A train don't matter. They didn't vote for him and they should suffer. Consequently, instead of the 20 minute non-rush hour wait time there is for other trains, one can wait 40 minutes to an hour for an A train. It's like livin in the suburbs with none of the good parts! One day mommy told me about these adorable little sculptures that appeared mysteriously at the 14th St station, "They're so round and soft and they're subversive and literally underground, and they remind me very much of you, my little Mungo, in that they're very cute and yet very vicious." "Do they bite?," I asked, while eating some topini. "Yes, some of them do. And some of them are homeless..." "Oh! We should adopt them!"

I asked mom to find out who did the beautiful bronze people, but, since she has a masters in Art History, she couldn't figure it out. Luckily, I came upon this in one of my favorite books:

from The Curious New Yorker : 329 Fascinating Questions and Surprising Answers About New York City , pp 150-151

Q: At the north end of the Hudson River Park in Battery Park City there's a bizarre sculpture/chess garden with all these little bronze figures pushing pennies, among other things, into a tower shape in the fountain. There are some little dead figures buried in the piles of coins, and a bodiless head. What is it?

A: It's called The Real World and it's definitely not the MTV show. It's the work of sculptor Tom Otterness, whose fondness for the little doughboy figures is a trademark. There are plaques, Mr. Otterness said, at the northern and southern entrances to the work. "But nobody ever sees them," he said. "They just step over them." The piece was unveiled in 1992 and combines cartoonish whimsy with a comment on the fickleness of the financial business that literally shadow the park. Mr. Otterness says he likes to drop by and watch families explore the work. "I go there with my three-year-old daughter, Kelly, " he said. "It's great to watch. The kids come up and say, 'Look, dead people!' and the parents go 'Eeeeechhhh.' And little kids go up and yell into the ear of the head that's lying down. It seems endless." Mr. Otterness's next big public work: designs for the Fourteenth Street subway station on Eighth Avenue, slated for completion in 1999.

Too bad The Curious New Yorker is out of print. It's fascinatin'! If you see a used one, gobble it up.

See the photos my moms took here.