Sarah Sze
1969–
Sarah Sze created Strange Attractor for a specific site—the area in front of the massive window on the fourth floor of the Whitney Museum’s Marcel Breuer–designed building— as part of the 2000 Biennial exhibition. Intended to be viewed both in the gallery and from Madison Avenue, seventy-five feet below, the sculptural installation veritably explodes into space, its hundreds of parts radiating in multiple directions, extending up even past the open grid of the ceiling. The work has an additional local resonance: Sze sourced all of the materials used in its making from the neighborhood around the Museum. They are ordinary objects— aspirin tablets, plastic spoons, balsa wood, metal ladders, and paper tickets—similar to items found in the artist’s other intricate, architecturally scaled constructions.
Other elements render the arrangement dynamic: mirrors cause volleys of reflection; small whirring fans set bits of paper in motion; a humidifier dispenses steam; and water flows through a set of clear plastic tubes. These activities lend the work qualities of a delicate, organic ecosystem, in which interdependent parts change over time. (Sze’s title is a mathematical term, describing the pattern of behavior in a chaotic system.) Yet, in spite of the work’s subtle motion and initial sense of unruliness, Strange Attractor registers a finely calibrated equilibrium. Sze’s installations are precisely planned and configured; as she has explained: “My sculpture is an intersection of painterly ideas about composition and architectural ideas about the use and structure of space.”
Introduction
Sarah Sze (; born 1969) is an American artist and professor of visual arts at Columbia University. Sze's work explores the role of technology, information, and memory with objects in contemporary life utilizing everyday materials. Her work often represents objects caught in suspension. Drawing from Modernist traditions, Sze confronts the relationship between low-value mass-produced objects in high-value institutions, creating the sense that everyday life objects can be art. She has exhibited internationally and her works are in the collections of several major museums.
Wikidata identifier
Q3473432
Information from Wikipedia, made available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License . Accessed July 18, 2025.
Introduction
Uses detritus and everday objects to create site-specific installations. Included in the 1998 Berlin Biennale, the 1999 Venice Biennale and the 2000 Whitney Biennial. American sculptor, NYC.
Country of birth
United States
Roles
Artist, assemblage artist, installation artist, mixed-media artist, sculptor
ULAN identifier
500114674
Names
Sarah Sze
Information from the Getty Research Institute's Union List of Artist Names ® (ULAN), made available under the ODC Attribution License. Accessed July 18, 2025.
