Karen Ann MartinCentral Park between E 83rd St and E 84th StHeart Three · Location 295 · Drawn March 2003Hover over or select the image to reveal a hidden view.PhotographsDownload photograph 1Download photograph 2Download photograph 3Download photograph 4Download photograph 5Download photograph 6Download photograph 7Video podcast0:00A patch of grass west of the Metropolitan Museum of Art served as the location for this drawing.0:05To find the exact patch, you need to find a tree. The most northern and western point of the museum0:13points at this tree, sort of. The tree faces the museum and also faces a pine tree across the path.0:22The drawing was done between the tree and the museum and the tree is notable because it has0:27a low hanging branch about four feet off the ground with a beautiful weathered0:33split running about four feet off to the west along one of its major limbs.0:40This is Karen Ann Martin. She was drawn in March of 2003. Her drawing is counting0:48three people. I'm afraid that the documentation for our rendition of0:55Karen Ann Martin does not do the drawing a lot of justice. This drawing was done in the backyard1:01of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. We scraped away the snow to reveal the frosty glass beneath.1:06Then we found fallen branches and broke them in half. From the broken ends, we were able to get1:12our hands on strips of bark to pull back. These long strips became the foundation for the hair.1:19The photographs make the figure seem a lot flatter and more dismal than she appeared in the snow.1:24In fact, the grass offered a significant contrast to the snow around it, and her portrait was clearly readable and vibrant.1:31All of our work was done under the quiet and consistent gaze of the museum's security camera,1:37which jutted out decoratively from the corner of this building's hulking mass.1:42For all who saw this figure, whether while running, driving, or watching a TV monitor,1:48we hope that the consideration put into making her was abundantly clear.1:54Martin's friends say she was not just a type A personality. She was a type A plus. Competitive,2:00organized, in charge, on the stick to a fault. When water skiing, she would dip and slip a little2:07lower than most people. On snow, she always took the steeper, riskier route down. Golfing, she hit2:13from the men's tee. In 1989, Miss Martin became an American Airlines flight attendant and jumping up2:19onto a chair proclaimed to her friends there is now something special in the2:24air she liked to work the long hard halls especially the coast to coast← Location 294Heart Three · Location 295Location 296 →
