Moonrise, east. august

Rondinone’s series Moonrise—his 2005 figurative sculptures—are eight-foot-high busts derived from masks. Modeled in clay before being cast in aluminum and painted, the sculptures reveal the enduring marks of the artist’s hand.

Rondinone has long been interested in the subject of time, and he represents it here by the relationship between moon, tide, and calendar.  One of a series of the twelve sculptures, it was made in homage to the moon and is named after a month of the calendar year. These monumental visages, with playfully distorted faces that smile and grimace, convey a kind of fantasy, wonder and empathy in equal measure.