The Whitney's beautiful exploration of downtown New York features Gordon Matta-Clark’s Day’s End (which he made by cutting several massive openings into the dilapidated building that existed on Pier 52 where Gansevoort Street meets the Hudson River). He described it as a “temple to sun and water,” the museum states.
The exhibition will also include works by about 15 artists active in overlapping downtown Manhattan scenes in the 1970s and early 1980s.
Matta-Clark and Joan Jonas present the city itself as a character, "pointing to New York as a place that embodies both presence and invisibility," while artists like Alvin Baltrop and Jimmy Wright show the city's marginalized populations at the West Side piers and the Meatpacking District. Martin Wong and others documented the Bowery and Lower East Side, which were impacted by deteriorating economic conditions.