It’s the perfect time to explore five remarkable, large-scale sculptures found on campus. Next break or lunch hour, head outside with hat and sunglasses handy.
Singular forms
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With most students gone until fall and staff taking well-deserved breaks, a sense of quiet has settled across Yale. It’s the perfect time to enjoy the warm summer sunshine and explore five remarkable, large-scale sculptures situated throughout the campus. Next break or lunch hour, put aside your tool or pipette, close that laptop, and head outside with hat and sunglasses handy.
The Committee on Art in Public Spaces is responsible for advising the president about the numerous works of art situated in Yale’s public spaces. They make recommendations regarding the inventory, condition, and ways in which the university can make art more accessible to the community and visitors.
Ocean
Walking toward this large-scale, rusted steel sculpture, one may wonder why the artist chose to call it “Ocean.” The modern, abstract aspects of this bulky artwork starkly contrast with the neo-Gothic architecture and urban environment. Strolling around this somber hulk to observe the disparate welded and bolted pieces more closely, details of possible ship parts start to emerge — partial anchor chain links, a small funnel or smokestack, a propeller blade, a hatch, and beams. Set in front of Street Hall’s cocoa-brown stone facade on a concrete pad and nestled among ivy, flowers, and dwarf trees, Ocean’s dark chocolate-weathered metal can be easily missed.
Date: 1982 – 1983
Location: Corner of Chapel and High Streets
Artist: Anthony Caro (1924 –2013), D.F.A. Hon. ’89
Collection: Yale University Art Gallery
Giamatti Bench
The 22-ton, gray granite Giamatti Bench sits in the northwest corner of Old Campus outside Lanman Wright Hall. Donated as a twenty-fifth reunion gift from his Yale classmates, it honors the university’s nineteenth president, A. Bartlett Giamatti ’60, ’64 Ph.D., who served from 1978 to 1986. Despite its solid granite construction, the bench’s smooth seat and back offer surprising comfort and warmth, especially on a sunny day. Its top surface is in a raw, quarried state, and the back has long, symmetric grooves leftover from boreholes made to cleave the stone in two. From this peaceful stone perch, sitters can people-watch or listen to birdsong and rustling leaves, mixed in with distant echoes of the city beyond.
Date: 1990
Location: Old Campus
Artists: David Sellers ’60, ’65 MArch and James Sardonis (b. 1951)
Collection: Campus Art Collection
An American Dream
A more lighthearted sculpture stands near the Jane Ellen Hope Building, surrounded by ample ivy and slightly overgrown shrubbery. This life-size, three-dimensional bronze piece depicts a dynamic scene of two teenagers engaged in a game of basketball. It was created by Dr. Wayne O. Southwick, who taught at the Yale School of Medicine and served as chief of orthopedic surgery for over three decades before retiring in 1993.
This playful artwork demonstrates the artist’s attention to detail, evident in elements such as the girl’s ponytail, both player’s sneakers and the look of anticipation on the boy’s face. The girl appears airborne and poised to shoot, conveying a sense of movement and youthful energy.
Date: 1993
Location: Cedar Street
Artist: Dr. Wayne O. Southwick (1923-2016)
Collection: Campus Art Collection
Column
For a taste of mid-century modern art, meander over to Paul Rudolph Hall to see the aptly named Column. Made of reinforced concrete and bolted to the building’s side, its relatively smooth surface stands out against the rough, corrugated exterior walls of the Brutalist-styled structure. Upon closer inspection, the four-sided, approximately twenty-foot Column reveals itself as a series of square and rectangular stacked blocks fused together and pierced with oblong holes of varying sizes. The names inscribed along one corner of this geometric artwork were colleagues of the sculptor Robert Engman, ’55 M.F.A., who taught at Yale when the then Art & Architecture Building was under construction.
Date: 1963
Location: Paul Rudolph Building, Chapel Street
Artist: Robert Engman ’55 M.F.A. (1927-2018)
Collection: Campus Art Collection
The Garden (Pyramid, Sun, and Cube)
Looking down into the sunken marble courtyard on Beinecke Plaza, observers discover that The Garden (Pyramid, Sun, and Cube) is not three separate sculptures, but a single, integrated work of art. Designed as part of the Beinecke Library’s original architecture, this installation can be viewed from both the basement reading room and the exterior plaza above. The sculpture’s three elements — a pyramid representing the earth, a circle symbolizing the sun, and a cube embodying chance — rest on the courtyard floor, interconnected by geometric lines. Crafted entirely of white marble, it dazzles enough on bright summer days to require sunglasses. This stone, Zen-like garden is striking yet also functional, allowing daylight to stream into Beinecke’s reading room and the offices adjacent to the courtyard.
Date: 1963
Location: Hewitt Quadrangle (Beinecke Plaza)
Artist: Isamu Noguchi (1904-1988)
Collection: Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library
