What My Dad Gave Me

This summer looks to be shaping up as a good one for temporary installations in NYC. David Byrne's Playing the Building (see earlier post) opened at the beginning of the month, Olafur Eliasson's Waterfalls opens in a couple of weeks, and Chris Burden's What My Dad Gave Me opened yesterday in Rockefeller Center (a place that Burden's dad once worked as an engineer).

Chris Burden is best known for his 1970's body-art performances which included being shot in the arm (he only intended the bullet to graze) and being crucified to a Volkswagen Beetle. But he's long since left that oeuvre behind for installations usually involving toys & vehicles.

What My Dad Gave Me is a 65 foot, stainless-steel Erector set skyscraper. Sixty-five feet is equivalent to a 6.5 story building--a pretty decent size in most towns, but just a scale a model of a building in mid-town New York.