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High-wire walker Philippe Petit, best known in New York as that brave (or insane) person who walked between the Twin Towers in 1974, is getting ready for his next NYC stunt at the St. John the Divine Cathedral in Morningside Heights on February 1 at 6pm — this time, with permission.
Petit is going to walk through the ribbons of Divine Pathways, a temporary exhibit in the Cathedral created by Brooklyn-based artist Anne Patterson. The exhibit includes more than 1,100 individual ribbons that hang down from the top of the Cathedral that add up to more than 16 miles of fabric.
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Petit, who is now 74 years old, is not fazed by the upcoming task. It’s not his first time walking across St. John the Divine; in fact, he’s walked across its nave at least twice, per the New York Times. Petit and Patterson worked together to make sure the art installation and his walk would work complement each other well — Petit plans to set two masts on either side of the Cathedral’s nave and walk straight through the instillation, creating a rippling effect as his body and balancing pole make contact with the ribbons.
“Working with another artist in another medium gives me a new sense of my own art. For me, high wire walking is an art form, grounded in theater, dance, cinema, painting, sculpture,” Petit says. “I want my audiences to see something beautiful, to inspire them, literally to raise their sights.”
High wire walking is an art form, grounded in theater, dance, cinema, painting, sculpture.
Petit, who is a current artist in residence at the Cathedral, has had an illustrious career and doesn’t plan to retire anytime soon. Although his most famous high-wire walks were extremely dangerous and highly illegal, charges against him from his World Trade walk were dropped on the condition that he give a free high wire show for children over Belvedere Lake in Central Park (he did). In 2008, the documentary about his World Trade Center walk, Man on Wire, won an Academy Award for Best Documentary.
There are three ticket tiers for this much-anticipated event: General admission tickets range from $25-$50. Reserved VIP seating is $250 and includes post-event cocktails with Petit and Patterson. For $1,000, attendees can attend the post event cocktails plus a dinner with the artists. You can get your tickets here.