VIK MUNIZ | about "clouds"

Creative Time presents Clouds, Vik Muniz's public art project which coincides with his show at the Whitney Museum of American Art and the premiere of a full-length documentary about his work. Four times during a six day period, starting February 20th, a skywriter will draw a series ofclouds over the Manhattan skyline. Using an outline of a cloud designed by Muniz, the "clouds" will be drawn by a crop-dusting plane that has been re-worked for skywriting. Millions of viewers will have a moment to pause, smile and escape from the winter doldrums as they look up into the sky.

Muniz, an internationally respected Brazilian artist, uses his interest and knowledge of the history of photography to demonstrate how we as viewers can be easily deceived by the images that we see around us. He works in a variety of mediums-sugar, chocolate, dust, cotton and string-creating what he calls, "low-tech illusions." Clouds is a clear expression of this artistic concern, as skywriting is an ideal medium to demonstrate the fleeting nature of images.

Clouds coincides with The Whitney Museum of American Art's show, The Things Themselves: Pictures of Dust by Vik Muniz (January 27-May 20, 2001) as well as the release of a documentary Worst Possible Illusion: The Curiosity Cabinet of Vik Muniz, a Mixed Greens production.