Berlin-based Argentinian artist Tomas Saraceno exposes the art of the web through artistic collaboration with spiders and proposes a conversation between human and nonhuman life-forms with floating sculptures and interactive installations at The Shed. Building on the terrible beauty of spiderwebs that could be deadly for insects, "Particular Matter(s)" has filled the New York art gallery with artificial spider webs.
The $404-million-construction, which looks less like a shed and more like a giant steel cushion, first opened in 2019 and has become a high-profile new platform for art in the 21st century.
The versatile space is part of the controversial new Hudson Yards neighborhood, a massive complex overlooking the Hudson River on the west side of Manhattan. It's also the home to many luxury apartments and high-end shops for New York's ultrarich.
According to the official website of The Shed, "Particular Matter(s)," which is the artist’s largest show in the United States to date, celebrates the complexity of the collective existence of human and nonhuman life-forms while looking for ways to live together differently.
Some of Saraceno's webs that fill the space as part of the exhibition, which opened on Feb. 11, even glow in the dark and can be seen lit up behind glass. Others give visitors the feeling of what it's like to be trapped in a web, as they enter an artificial web with a diameter of around 30 meters (98.43 feet). There they experience a short performance involving darkness, sounds and vibrations. The show at the art gallery is scheduled to run until April 17.
