Swoon: Submerged Motherlands at the Brooklyn Museum of Art

Fusing the aesthetics of an art-school education with the environmental immediacy of street art, Swoon has come to fame in the last few years for her large, intricate, wheat-pasted prints, urban interventions, and community-based projects. Submerged Motherlands brings her practice indoors in order to create a new, immersive environment within the Brooklyn Museum’s 5th floor rotunda gallery. Look up, look down, stand back, plunge in—the installation encourages a thorough investigation of its many nooks and crannies, and rewards the viewer at every angle.

Swoon: Submerged Motherlands will be on view until August 24, 2014. For more information, visit the Brooklyn Museum’s website.

All photos by Renée DeVoe Mertz, May 4, 2014.

New York, May 2014

Zoe Leonard (b. 1961). 945 Madison Avenue, 2014. Lens and darkened room (camera obscura). Whitney Biennial; Curator: Anthony Elms.
Kiki Smith (b. 1954). Lilith, 1994, United States. Bronze with glass eyes. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Jean de Liège (d. 1381). Tomb Effigy Bust of Marie of France, c. 1381, from the Chapel of Notre-Dame-la-Blanche, Royal Abbey of Saint-Denis, Ile-de-France, France. Marble with lead inlays. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Miljohn Ruperto (b. 1971); animated by Aimee de Jongh (b. 1988). Janus, 2014. Digital video, color, sound. 3:30 min. Whitney Biennial; Curator: Stuart Comer.
Dan Graham (b. 1942) with Günther Vogt (b. 1957). Roof Garden Commission, 2014, United States. Ivy, steel, mirrored glass. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Ai Weiwei (b. 1957). Moon Chest, 2008. 7 chests in huali wood. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Alma Allen (b. 1970). Three Untitled sculptures, 2013. Marble on walnut and walnut on aluminum. Whitney Biennial; Curator: Michelle Grabner.
Ai Weiwei (b. 1957). Coca-Cola Vase, 2007. Neolithic vase (5000–3000 BCE) and paint. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Circle of Conrad Meit of Worms (1480s–1550/51). Lucretia, 1500–15, Flanders. Boxwood. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
View across the roof of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, May 2, 2014.
Ai Weiwei (b. 1957). He Xie, 2010. 3,200 porcelain crabs. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Jean-Joseph Carriès (1855–94). Le Grenouillard, c. 1891, France. Stoneware. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Riccio (Andrea Briosco, 1470–1532). Striding Satyr with Vase Inkwell and Shell Lamp, ca. 1507, Padua. Bronze. (Metropolitan Museum of Art)
Swoon (Caledonia Dance Curry, b. 1978). Swoon: Submerged Motherlands, 2014. Mixed media installation with the boats, Alice and Maria, from a former 2008 performance. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Lucas Samaras (b. 1936). Untitled, A, 1966, United States. Graphite and incised lines on paper. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Charlemagne Palestine (b. 1945). hauntteddd!! nhuntteddd!! n daunttlesss!! n shuntteddd!!, 2013. Stairwell installation with toys, speakers, sound. Whitney Biennial; Curator: Anthony Elms.
Bjarne Melgaard (b. 1967). 2014 installation with mixed media and video. Whitney Biennial; Curator: Stuart Comer.
Pierre-Adrien Dalpayrat (1844–1910) and Alphonse Voisin-Delacroix (1857–1893). Vase with Face, 1892–93, France. Stoneware. Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Ai Weiwei (b. 1957). Ruyi, 2012. Porcelain. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Swoon (Caledonia Dance Curry, b. 1978). Swoon: Submerged Motherlands, 2014. Mixed media installation with the boats, Alice and Maria, from a former 2008 performance. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Ai Weiwei (b. 1957). Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Swoon (Caledonia Dance Curry, b. 1978). Swoon: Submerged Motherlands, 2014. Mixed media installation with the boats, Alice and Maria, from a former 2008 performance. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Ai Weiwei (b. 1957). Bowls of Pearls, 2006. Porcelain bowls and freshwater pearls. Brooklyn Museum of Art.
Saint Elzéar, c. 1370–73, from the Franciscan church, Apt, Provence, France. Alabaster. Metropolitan Museum of Art.

All photos by Renée DeVoe Mertz, May 2–4, 2014.