A large-scale installation by the sculptor Elyn Zimmermann which was previously slated for demolition officially reopened today (April 4) with a new name and design on the campus of American University in Washington, DC.
The newly reconfigured work, titled Sudama (2023), was originally constructed in 1984 as a site-specific work for the National Geographic Society under the name Marabar (1984), but was threatened with demolition in 2017 when the National Geographic Society informed Zimmerman that it planned to dismantle the work as part of a campus redesign. SudamaThe relocation and redesign comes after a protracted preservation campaign, led by the non-profit Cultural Landscape Foundation, which has seen the work become the subject of much legal and curatorial debate.
In March 2020, after learning of National Geographic Society demolition plans Marabar, the foundation mounted a far-reaching publicity effort focused on building support for the artwork, which was Zimmerman’s first public sculpture and a relatively rare example of Land Art in the eastern United States. United. The foundation’s campaign included letters from the support of personalities from the art world like the director of the Whitney Museum, Adam Weinberg, who said that MarabarZimmerman’s demolition would be “similar to the destruction of an irreplaceable site of ecological or cultural heritage” and noted the relative paucity of Zimmerman’s work as a woman in the male-dominated Land Art tradition.
Elyn Zimmerman, Sudama (2023), American University, Washington, DC Photo ©Nord Wennerstrom, courtesy of the Cultural Landscape Foundation
In addition to gaining public support, the foundation petitioned local historic preservation councils to fight the planned renovation, arguing that even moving a site-specific artwork like Marabar was tantamount to destroying it. The foundation’s arguments drew attention to broader lack of definitions and protections granted to site-specific public art.
In March 2021, the District of Columbia’s Historic Preservation Review Board rejected the foundation’s arguments and reaffirmed his 2019 decision endorsing the National Geographic Society’s planned renovations, stating that the 1984 facility did not meet the criteria for historic preservation.
Following this decision, the National Geographic Society agreed to pay the moving and rebuilding of Marabar on a site chosen by Zimmerman. After selecting the American University campus, Zimmerman changed some aspects of the facility’s design to reflect the new location. These changes included a new crescent-shaped reflecting pool, as well as a new configuration of the large, polished 450,000-pound boulders that make up the core of Marabarits structure. After these changes, Zimmerman felt a new name was needed.
Elyn Zimmerman, Sudama (2023), American University, Washington, DC Photo ©Nord Wennerstrom, courtesy of the Cultural Landscape Foundation
“The title Marabar was inspired by EM Forster’s book description A passage to India of one of many caves in India that were carved 3,000 years ago out of natural solid rock,” Zimmerman explained in an interview with the foundation. “His book describes one cave in particular…Sudama. It is entered through a rectangular passageway that leads to a tall, long, barrel-vaulted space with polished “mirror” walls and a vaulted ceiling. The polish is to support the extraordinary acoustics experienced in the space which has been used for centuries by religious devotees for meditation and chanting.
A similar debate over reconfiguring an outdoor art space was simultaneously unfolding elsewhere in Washington, as the Smithsonian’s Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Park lobbied for a redesign of its sculpture park, which, as the museum building, was designed by brutalist architect Gordon Bunshaft. In 2019, the Hirshhorn selected artist Hiroshi Sugimoto to redesign the park, triggering a dispute with curators, including the Cultural Landscape Foundation.
In the Hirshhorn Sculpture Park debate, the decision ultimately fell to the National Capital Planning Commission, which approved Sugimoto’s design at the end of 2021. Last November, US First Lady Jill Biden chaired an inauguration ceremony for the renovation of the park.
