Master Work: Astoria Houses, Building 24 :: EAF 15  ::  Socrates Sculpture Park 

Master Work: Astoria Houses, Building 24 was a site-specific installation at Socrates Sculpture Park 09.27.15 - 03.13.16. The installation mapped the footprint of a single tower of NYCHA's Astoria Houses. The public housing complex, home to over 3,100 individuals, is located just north of Socrates Sculpture Park. Composed of stainless steel tubing and mixed media, the installation marked the outline of the building’s form at roughly two-fifths scale. Unlike an imposing tower of solid brick and mortar, Armstead’s idealized Building 24 was minimal and porous, allowing light, visitors, and the landscape to filter through the structure in an active, inviting manner.

Master Work was a work in the series called Farther Land. The works are puzzles, persistently enigmatic objects, that reflect on the legacy of the founders’ high ideals and the penalty for deviation from them. The series responds to the age of revolution and the slave owning founders’ declaration that “all men are created equal” with matching irony and suggestive material content.

Recent Press:  Art and Artist, Exposed to the Elements,  Natasa Bansagi, NY City Lens

Master Work: Astoria Houses, Building 24, Stainless steel, tar, feathers, 18' x 38' x 38', 2015 (photographed by Nate Dorr)