Bending Arc
Internationally renowned artist and Tampa Bay native Janet Echelman has created one of her famous billowing net sculptures to dazzle Pier visitors. “Bending Arc” measures a massive 72 feet at its highest point and 424 feet at its widest and is perpetually in motion with the wind. The artist titled the sculpture Bending Arc in reference to MLK’s words: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
Janet Echelman, who grew up in Tampa and was educated at Harvard, has several of her billowing net sculptures in prominent places around the world, including one in Seattle commissioned by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The Guggenheim Fellow’s artworks meet at the intersection of sculpture, architecture, urban design and engineering, and are often on the scale of buildings and city blocks. They are revered for their ability to move and shape-shift in response to their natural surroundings. The hypnotically immersive “Bending Arc” required 180 miles of twine and more than 1.5 million knots. It represents Echelman’s largest permanent artwork to date in a portfolio that includes huge pieces in San Francisco, West Hollywood, Phoenix, Philadelphia, Porto, Portugal and elsewhere. In all, her work has been installed in 38 cities on four continents.
Website