Work By Famed Sculptor Comes To Long Island City Waterfront

HUNTERS POINT, QUEENS — A work by famed sculptor Gaston Lachaise is coming to the Long Island City waterfront.

A cast of Lachaise's sculpture "Floating Woman," which dates back to 1927, will call Hunter's Point South Park home for the next year.

It will be unveiled at 3 p.m. Thursday in a live-streamed ceremony featuring a performance by members of the Queensboro Dance Festival.

The temporary installation near 51st Avenue and Center Boulevard is the product of a partnership between the Lachaise Foundation, the Hunters Point Parks Conservancy, the NYC Parks Department and Queens Community Board 2.

“We are thrilled that this powerful majestic woman will be welcoming visitors to the park and looking out for their safety," Rob Basch, president of the Hunters Point Parks Conservancy, said in a statement.

The work was cast at the Modern Art Foundry in Astoria and is one of nine existing casts, according to a news release. Others can be seen at the Museum of Modern Art, Princeton University and Musée d’Art Moderne de Paris, among other institutions.

The sculpture, which represents a timeless earth goddess, was inspired by Lachaise's wife, Isabel, according to the Lachaise Foundation. It is meant as a tribute to the power of all women and to "Woman," with a capital "W," as he referred to his wife.

“Placed at the end of the line of railroad tracks, the sculpture looks back at the historic city where Lachaise once thrived, and forward out across the East River, a harbinger of hope, beautifully situated in this elegant and dynamic but at the same time rustic Hunters Point South Park, a true oasis in a busy city," Paula Hornbostel, director of the Lachaise Foundation, said in a statement. "May this work empower women everywhere with its depiction of spiritual beauty."