Meet Wendy.
Wendy isn’t just an eye-popping sculpture or a piece of bright blue spiky architecture. She isn’t merely an interactive play ground or just an environmental installation, but Wendy is friends with the environment. She is composed of nylon fabric that has been treated with this ‘new thing’ called titania nanoparticle spray, which actually neutralizes airborne pollutants. So while the rest of us are out in the sun, driving to the beach and enjoying time off this summer, Wendy will have cleaned the air from the exhaust and pollutants of 260 cars. Kinda cool, for something so.. sharp.
Wendy is the new installation in the courtyard of MoMA PS1 in Long Island City. She is the winning design from the Young Architects Program and was executed by HWKN. She is 56 feet high, has fans to circulate the fresh air she creates, and mists patrons as they walk up into her. Every five minutes, Wendy shoots out a fresh stream of water from her water canon. You can dance and have drinks with Wendy every weekend until September 8. In the courtyard, where a DJ will be spinning from inside her…… (yes, really.)
read more about Wendy Here. Here & Here.
some thoughts on Wendy
It is iconic, but with a twist. By combining off-the-shelf materials and scaffolding systems with the latest cry in nanotechnology it is able to produce both an out-of-the-box ecological statement and a bold architectural gesture. It is economical and terse in terms of its design, and yet, through its positioning and scale, it also smartly projects different possibilities for use and social appropriation across the entire site where it sits—including the ability to reach out for those outside the museum’s walls. – Pedro Gadanho, Curator of MoMA’s Department of Architecture and Design
“Wendy is like a woman. She blows hot and cold! She spews whenever she wants!” - Glen Lowry, MoMA director (I have found a couple variations of this quote so I am not sure which is accurate.. but all say more or less the same sexist remark)
Wendy … Instagramed.
Photograph by Iamlights
Photograph by Jenn Stevenson.
Photograph by Sean Wu.
Photograph by Todd Holmes Instagramed here.
a virtual tour of Wendy.
