STEEL

Check out these surface grinding stainless steel images:

The Cloud Gate

Image by Storm Crypt
A shot of the Cloud Gate — nicknamed "The Bean" from the south east corner of the AT&T Plaza. This view shows the eastern side of the sculpture, as well as the east arc entrance. The reflection shows a portion of the Chicago skyline.

The Cloud Gate
Millennium Park
Chicago, Illinois

NYC: Chase Manhattan Plaza – Sunken Garden

Image by wallyg
Isamu Noguchi’s Sunken Garden is situated in the open plaza in front of the Chase Manhattan Bank building. The base of the garden is set one story below street level in a circular space cut out from the plaza. This opening in the plaza is bordered on top by a metal railing, allowing viewers to stand comfortably at the edge and look into the sculpted space below. The space is surrounded on all sides by floor-to-ceiling windows, allowing the garden to be seen from the inside, and opening up the lower level of the building to the outdoors.

The "ground" of the garden is made up of small, light-colored stone bricks. The surface slopes gently, creating a series of low hills and valleys topped by seven black boulders of varying sizes that Noguchi collected from the bottom of the Uji River in Kyoto, Japan. The sloping of the surface is accentuated by the organization of the bricks, which circle around to show the contours of the ground. The lines from the bricks also serve to draw attention to the boulders, which are located on the highest points of the ground.

In the winter, Sunken Garden is dry. In the summer months, the garden turns into a fountain, with water spouting into the air, and flowing across the ground before disappearing around the edges of the space. Because of the variations in the level of the brick surface, some of the boulders are partly submerged, while others stand on dry ground, with water lapping around them.

Noguchi drew on the concept of Japanese Zen meditation gardens in his creation of Sunken Garden. As with these gardens, the viewer is not meant to enter Sunken Garden, but rather looks in from the outside. Additionally, the lines formed by the placement of the light-colored bricks are reminiscent of the raked sand found in Japanese gardens.

Although Noguchi found inspiration for Sunken Garden in traditional Japanese gardens, in particular the garden at the Ryoan-ji Temple in Kyoto, Noguchi veered from tradition in many aspects of his design. Noguchi comments, "…I have never been interested in doing a Japanese garden per se." Instead, Noguchi chose what he wanted to include from among the many rules governing the design of Japanese gardens, and adjusted the rest to fit his needs. In describing some of his choices in Sunken Garden, Noguchi writes, "I had said that in the West the ideal was to triumph over gravity, and that in doing a rock garden in America it would be logical to have the rocks themselves levitate…" This is especially true of Sunken Garden in the summer time, when water flows across the surface of the ground except at the highest points, where the boulders are placed. Noguchi also combines eastern and western traditions in his inclusion of the European-style fountain in the garden.

Los Angeles born Isamu Noguchi (野口 勇, 1904-1988) was a sculptor, theatrical and industrial designer best known for his abstract works and set designs for MArtha Graham productions. News was one of his last figurative works, and the only time he employed stainless steel as an artistic medium. His work can be found throughout major metropolitan cities, in museums, and in the Isamu Noguchi Garden Museum in Long Island City in New York. Noguchi’s work around New York includes the Red Cube in Helmsley Plaza and News at the Associated Press Building His Thunder Rock was also temporarily on display in Rockefeller Plaza.