Synartesis | Jazz Leeb

Jazz Leeb’s circular ribbon-rope sculptures cap the openings to stove-pipes on all three floors of the museum. Streams of ribbon-rope extend from the mouths of the sculptures and playfully articulate a structuring condition in each room as they loop in and out of fissures in the interior façade of the building. While the rope cord on the first floor reinforces the geometrical forms of the textile installation that covers a wall there, the one in the second floor glass forest installation- a space filled with mirrors- shoots across the room like a shard of angling light. In the 3rd floor Whisper room, the rope is matched to the droop and buckle of the disintegrating wall paper there. As a site-specific intervention, Synartesis promotes attention to the numerous small breaks in the surface of the building and the void spaces that lie behind the museum walls. It also links disparate installation spaces and creates connection between the floors and literally through the walls of the museum.

First Floor, 606:

Second Floor, Glass Forest:

Third Floor, Ghost Room:

To create Synartesis, Leeb invited the public to join him in making the rope. Ribbons from the collection were used, and the winding of the rope mirrors Sylvia Gray’s activity of winding the ribbon into neat circular bundles for sale. Also part of this project, Leeb repaired several of the building’s ceramic stove-pipes and provided a much needed cover for one of the stove-pipe openings on the roof.

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