Art at Amtrak, a public art program that highlights rotating work from contemporary artists across stations, including Penn Station and Moynihan Train Hall, has just unveiled two new installations.
Artists Chitra Ganesh and Eirini Linardaki are enriching Penn Station in the program’s third year, while taking over Rico Gatson’s previous, half-a-year installation.
Chitra Ganesh’s Regeneration can be seen across the four pillars at the Amtrak rotunda at Penn Station, enhancing Coherence, her other work on digital display screens around Moynihan Train Hall. Regeneration is reminiscent of comic books and pop culture, featuring an array of plant life including Rose of Jericho, Welwitschia plant of Southwest Africa, and olives to represent resilience and longevity. She intends the work “to remind viewers of the vibrant life that thrives in nature, and to reconnect them with elements that transcend the limitations of humanity, ultimately encouraging a regeneration of perspective and a reset of both the mental and the physical.”
All together, Regeneration and Coherence make up Ganesh’s largest public art installation in her career so far.
In conjunction, Eirini Linardaki’s Working Background decorates Penn Station with large-scale mural panels to highlight the employees who keep the station running, such as electricians, conductors, cleaning personnel and so on.
Inspired by her personal connection to public transportation with her father being a previous bus driver, Linardaki not only met with the aforementioned workers but photographed them to really capture the essence of their roles. Layering African patterns and Hawaiian shirt prints (often the clothing Linardaki observed in the station) to create a digital collage, Working Background immortalize these workers and the “centrality of Penn Station to the city’s fabric.”
Art at Amtrak, curated by Debra Simon Art Consulting and produced by Common Ground Arts, intends “to energize trips through the Western Hemisphere’s busiest train station in the most creative city in the world.”
“The addition of multimedia artwork on Moynihan Train Hall’s digital screens is a natural next step in expanding the program’s footprint, highlighting the exceptional talent of artists across New York City and New Jersey and improving the customer experience,” said Amtrak Vice President, Northeast Corridor Service Line Jina Sanone.
You can now catch both new installation thanks to Art at Amtrak.