
Collection Online as of June 6, 2023
(Polish, b. 1972)
Steel, paint
Overall: 294.6 x 165.1 x 88.9 cm (116 x 65 x 35 in.)
Gift of Scott C. Mueller and Margaret Fulton Mueller and Sundry Art-Contemporary Fund 2011.1
not on view
Sosnowska is interested in modernism's fascination with utopian ideals, examples of which in Eastern Europe are now in ruins. Stairs, made during the artist's first residency in the United States, is an exact copy of fire-escape stairs seen in New York City. The newly rendered stairs were carefully bent with the use of forklifts, then painted with enamel oil-based paint, providing it with both sculptural elegance and uncanniness. Stairs uses the language of architecture to explore and analyze the ways in which form and function can be used to express a range of ideals, locations, and histories.