Liz Glynn: Open House
May 17 – November 9, 2026
Liz Glynn (American, b. 1981) reconstructed the couches, footstools, armchairs, and arched window forms of Open House based on images of Louis XIV-style furniture from an opulent Gilded Age ballroom. Glynn’s work is drawn from historic photos of the New York City mansion of the politician and financier William C. Whitney, which had been designed by the prominent architect Stanford White. Whitney’s grand Fifth Avenue home included an extravagant ballroom that was used just once a year in the late 1800s and early 1900s by approximately 400 of New York’s most distinguished social elite. For Open House, Glynn recast the furniture forms in concrete, a material more commonly seen in public plazas and housing projects.
An artist who uses sculpture and performance to explore the social and cultural history of objects, Glynn asks viewers to consider the continued resonance of the iconography of the ballroom today. She has said, “At the time this work was conceived, New York City had reached heights of income inequality not seen since the Gilded Age. . . . This piece is not just harkening back to the past; it is very much about the present.” First installed in 2017 at the southern end of Central Park, just blocks from where the Whitney mansion once stood, Open House restaged the Whitney ballroom in the middle of New York City. The installation—whose title nods to the real estate term for showing a property to interested viewers—opened up the exclusive space of the historical ballroom for all who encountered it.
At Storm King, Open House is placed directly in the natural landscape for the first time, allowing it to function as a ruin or an anachronistic architectural folly, the remnants of a bygone era altered by time and the elements. Nestled in the grasses, Glynn’s sculptures welcome visitors to imagine the origin and former lives of the displaced furniture.
Liz Glynn: Open House is organized by Adela Goldsmith, Assistant Curator. Liz Glynn: Open House was originally presented by Public Art Fund in New York City.
An artist who uses sculpture and performance to explore the social and cultural history of objects, Glynn asks viewers to consider the continued resonance of the iconography of the ballroom today. She has said, “At the time this work was conceived, New York City had reached heights of income inequality not seen since the Gilded Age. . . . This piece is not just harkening back to the past; it is very much about the present.” First installed in 2017 at the southern end of Central Park, just blocks from where the Whitney mansion once stood, Open House restaged the Whitney ballroom in the middle of New York City. The installation—whose title nods to the real estate term for showing a property to interested viewers—opened up the exclusive space of the historical ballroom for all who encountered it.
At Storm King, Open House is placed directly in the natural landscape for the first time, allowing it to function as a ruin or an anachronistic architectural folly, the remnants of a bygone era altered by time and the elements. Nestled in the grasses, Glynn’s sculptures welcome visitors to imagine the origin and former lives of the displaced furniture.
Liz Glynn: Open House is organized by Adela Goldsmith, Assistant Curator. Liz Glynn: Open House was originally presented by Public Art Fund in New York City.
Liz Glynn: Open House is made possible with lead support by Sidney E. Frank Foundation, major support by Janet Benton and David Schunter, Jennifer Brorsen and Richard DeMartini, Roberta and Steven Denning, the Hazen Polsky Foundation, and Samuel Freeman Charitable Trust, and supported in part by The Helis Foundation and Paula Cooper Gallery.
This project is supported through a Market New York grant awarded by Empire State Development, and I LOVE NY, New York State’s Division of Tourism.
®I LOVE NEW YORK is a registered trademark and service mark of the New York State Department of Economic Development; used with permission.