In the Name of Water: Saint John the Divine Hosts a Major Exhibition on this Essential Fluid | CultureMob

Through March 25, 2012, The Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine, located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, will be hosting the major exhibition “The Value of Water: Sustaining a Green Planet”. This exhibition gathers the work of 41 contemporary and modern visual artists who explore water as a subject for their art.

Upon crossing the threshold of the cathedral you understand the difficult question the organizers of this exhibition must have faced: How to mount an exhibition on contemporary art in a gothic Cathedral? St. John The Divine happens to be the largest gothic cathedral in the world. The curatorial decision was to integrate the art with the original architecture and lighting of the church.

It was a largely effective technique: Bill Viola’s videos establish such a connection with the environment that it seems as if they were originally conceived to be projected exactly there. However, in certain cases, such as Rothko’s small paintings, the art gets lost in the grandeur of the cathedral. Either way, “The Value of Water” has the immense merit of gathering compelling works of artists such as William Kentridge, Teresita Fernández, Gülsen Calik, Robert Longo, Trenton Doyle Hancock and Nobuho Nagasawa, and showing to the public the various ways each deals with water as a subject.

Nobuho Nagasawa, Bodywaves, 2011

The aim of this exhibition is not purely artistic, and as such enters in a larger conversation at the Cathedral about the global water crisis. The vast programming includes talks with water activists and writers, along with forums, performances, storytelling, poetry and music. For a full schedule of activities visit http://www.stjohndivine.org/.