Particular Matter(s)

FEB 11 – APR 17

A large-scale exhibition and sensory experience with spiderwebs, air, and the cosmic web

Tomás Saraceno: Particular Matter(s) features an expansive gallery exhibition as well as a newly commissioned sensory experience, Free the Air: How to hear the universe in a spider/web, a 95-foot-diameter installation in The Shed’s soaring McCourt space.

Tickets are now available for visits through February 27.

About this commission

“Saraceno’s work is playful, even childlike, yet mind-bogglingly sophisticated and political.”

—The New York Times

Through floating sculptures, interactive installations, and an artistic process that centers collaboration, often with spiders and their webs, artist Tomás Saraceno proposes a conversation between human and nonhuman lifeforms. These beings have been disregarded by humans in the Capitalocene, a name for the era of Earth’s existence that we’re living in, characterized by the destructive effects of capitalism on the environment. In a call for environmental justice, Saraceno also collaborates with human communities that have been impacted by these negative effects to renew relationships with Earth, the air, and the cosmos, particularly as part of his community projects, Aerocene and Arachnophilia.

Particular Matter(s), the artist’s largest exhibition in the US to date, brings this layered approach together, celebrating the complexity of our collective existence while looking for ways to live together differently. The exhibition features new and existing works in The Shed’s galleries and a newly commissioned sensory experience, Free the Air: How to hear the universe in a spider/web, a 95-foot-diameter installation in the soaring McCourt space. The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue and a robust public program in partnership with the Earth Institute, Columbia University.

Organized by Emma Enderby, Curator-at-Large, with Alessandra Gómez and Adeze Wilford, Assistant Curators

Conversation Series

In partnership with Columbia University’s Climate School and Studio Tomás Saraceno, The Shed presents a series of six moderated conversations to explore key issues around climate change and environmental justice, while identifying connections with Saraceno’s work on view. The conversations will be offered both in person at The Shed and online for free. Check back for details on how to participate.

The Bloomberg Building
545 West 30th Street
New York, NY 10001