Undercurrent, 2023, a twenty-foot-tall stainless-steel sculpture by Beijing-based artist Zheng Lu (b. 1978, Inner Mongolia), is on view through August 2024 in Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza, adjacent to the United Nations. The sculpture, weighing nearly 2.5 tons, was more than two years in the making. The project was initiated by Sundaram Tagore Gallery.
Zheng Lu’s sculpture is installed just north of the United Nations headquarters at 47th Street and First Avenue. Zheng is the first Chinese artist to exhibit work in Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza.
The glimmering sculpture was created especially for the site and relates to the United Nations’ recent action initiatives on clean water and climate change.
Zheng’s reverence for nature is often reflected in his work, particularly his Water in Dripping sculptures. For Zheng, water is a symbol of temperate planet earth, where the presence of water—a rapidly diminishing resource—permits life. As a student of Chinese philosophy, he also views water as symbolic of change, self-reflection and the passage of time. This installation reinforces the gallery’s longstanding mission to use art as a vehicle to bring people from cultures across the world together.
Zheng Lu’s sculptures have been exhibited around the world, including, most recently, in Summoning Memories: Art Beyond Chinese Traditions at the Asia Society Texas.
he project was organized in conjunction with the Art in the Parks program, overseen by New York City’s Department of Parks and Recreation and facilitated by World Council of Peoples for the United Nations (WCPUN) as part of its mission to raise awareness about the United Nations’ goals, including UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6, concerning access to clean water and sanitation, and SDG 13 on climate change.
For nearly sixty years, NYC Parks’ Art in the Parks program has brought contemporary public artworks to the city’s parks, making New York City one of the world’s largest open-air galleries. The agency has consistently fostered the creation and installation of temporary public art in parks throughout the five boroughs. Since 1967, NYC Parks has collaborated with arts organizations and artists to produce more than 3,000 public artworks by 1,500 notable and emerging artists in more than 200 parks.
Artists who have exhibited in the program include Alexander Calder, Jean Dubuffet, Sol LeWitt, Jenny Holzer, Keith Haring, Barbara Kruger, Ai Weiwei, El Anatsui, Rashid Johnson and Simone Leigh.