The award-winning team at RSVP Studio led by Brian Ripel drew broadly on artistic, architectural, and local sources in creating East of East.
- Piet Mondrian
- Richard Serra
- P.S. 1
- Long Island City’s industrial past
Learn more about Brian Ripel and RSVP Studio.
Piet Mondrian
The lines and colors of Mondrian’s abstract paintings created a style so distinctive that anyone can identify them in an instant. C2150-606 The Dutch painter created several of his most famous works while living in New York. Hanging in New York’s Museum of Modern Art is one of his most significant: Broadway Boogie Woogie from 1943.
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Look at the Mondrian images at MoMA’s online collection.
Richard Serra
Serra is one of the most significant artists of the 20th century, whose trademark monumental sculptures make use of a distinctive steel material known for its bright oxidized patina. 70-703 The material changes with time even as its form stays strong and unmoveable.
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The steel cladding of East of East is made from — not aluminum or brick or other common elements — but from Serra’s choice material: Cor-Ten steel, the brand name for weathering steel used by the US Steel company.
Read more about this major artist’s works at the Museum of Modern Art (where he had a major show in 2007 as East of East was being designed), at Gagosian Gallery (his gallery in New York), or at PBS.
P.S. 1
East of East responds directly to P.S.1/MoMA’s sharp angles and red-colored facade. And it draws deeply from the many artists whose works have been displayed inside.
LIC’s industrial past
Long Island City was long the center of manufacturing — including iron and steel works producing manhole covers and other heavy materials — in the New York area. Any history of the neighborhood inevitably connects to the role of this area, and its architectural legacy.