By JEREMY OLSHAN
Last updated: 8:07 am
June 26, 2008
Posted: 3:23 am
June 26, 2008
New York falls in love today.
Scandinavian artist Olafur Eliasson will throw the switch on the four, 90- to 120-foot high unnatural waterfalls he installed on the East River, a $15.5 million project intended to help the city appreciate the natural beauty it takes for granted.
The idea is not a new one. Landscape artist Frederick Law Olmstead had a similar notion 150 years ago, when he installed a series of waterfalls in Manhattan in an effort to recreate the natural beauty the city had lost.
The waterfalls, at Pier 35 on the east side of Manhattan, under the Brooklyn Bridge in DUMBO, on the Brooklyn Heights waterfront, and at Governors Island, will each be illuminated after sundown.
A project of the Public Art Fund, the falls required $13.5 million in private donations, including a big gift from Bloomberg LP., and the remainder was paid for by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation.
