Artist Interview—The Facade Commission: Nairy Baghramian, Scratching the Back | Met Exhibitions

Go behind the scenes with artist Nairy Baghramian, who discusses the inspiration and making of The Met’s 2023 Facade Commission. For The Met Fifth Avenue’s facade niches, Nairy Baghramian has created four abstract polychrome sculptures with components that seem to have washed up like flotsam and jetsam in the voids of their respective niches. The project is the artist’s first public installation in New York City and is the fourth in the series of contemporary commissions for The Met’s facade. Born in Iran in 1971, Nairy Baghramian fled to Berlin, Germany, in 1984, where she continues to live and work. Baghramian creates abstract sculptures that explore the dynamics of the body, gender, and dichotomies of private and public space. Her site-responsive sculptures and installations engage with architecture and often evoke bodily gestures, junctures, or fragments. Along with site responsivity, other hallmarks of Baghramian’s work are polychromy and the innovative and subversive use of different types of material. On view September 7, 2023 through May 28, 2024. Learn more about the exhibition: The exhibition is made possible by the Jane and Robert Carroll Fund, the Director’s Fund, Angela A. Chao and Jim Breyer, Robert Denning, Cynthia Hazen Polsky and Leon B. Polsky, and The Hayden Family Foundation. Additional support is provided by Marguerite Steed Hoffman, Melony and Adam Lewis, Nancy A. Nasher and David J. Haemisegger, Jerry Speyer and Katherine Farley, and Carlo Bronzini Vender and Tanya Traykovski. Production credits: Director/Managing Producer: Kate Farrell Editor: Lucas Groth Producer: Melissa Bell Production Coordinator: Lela Jenkins Production Assistants: Tess Solot-Kehl, Aurola Wedman Alfaro, Ann Collins Director of Photography: Jeffrey Johnson Jib Camera: Kelly Richardson Additional Footage: Josh Kun Time Lapse Photography: Wilson Santiago Sound: David Raymond Original Music: Austin Fisher *Correction: Thanks to: Akili Tommasino, Michel Ziegler, Nicolas Hsiung, Benjamin Softic, Oscar Murillo for “Arepas y Tamales“, 2022 Subscribe for new content from The Met: #TheMet #Art #TheMetropolitanMuseumofArt #Museum © 2023 The Metropolitan Museum of Art