Client: City of Alexandria
Location: Alexandria, VA, United States
Completion date: 2021
Artwork budget: $110,000
Project Team
Artist
Mark Reigelman
REIGELMAN
Project Manager
Diane Ruggiero
City of Alexandria
Public Art Consultant
Meridith McKinley
Via Partnership
Fabrication/Installation
Joe Riche
Demiurge
Structural Engineering
Nick Geurts
Yetiweurks
Overview
Commissioned to create a temporary immersive installation for King Street Park, Reigelman focused on Alexandria’s working waterfront as the shoreline crept further into the Potomac River. Starting in the 18th century, thousands of timber pilings sprawled further into the Potomac River each decade, outlining the city’s shifting foundation. Alexandria grew from a town on a lofty riverbank to one with a sprawling dock that stretched along miles of artificially reclaimed land.
GROUNDSWELL overlooked the Potomac River from the Old Town Alexandria’s waterfront. Consisting of 100 raw wood pilings ranging in height from 12-46” and topped with a cobalt-mirror surface, the pilings’ undulating profile was determined by the topographical map illustrated in the floor mural, derived from the Potomac River’s contours. The mirror tops on GROUNDSWELL’s pilings shimmered in the light like water, mimicking the unfixed shoreline and reflecting different angles of the sky and faces of passersby. Growth rings were etched into the blue acrylic mirrors’ surface, pointing to the ever-shifting waterfront boundary. The immersive orientation encouraged visitors to interact with and navigate through the pilings’ grid-like ecosystem, considering their place in the city’s history at this moment in time.
Goals
GROUNDSWELL was the fourth installation in the annual Site See: New Views in Old Town temporary public art series in Alexandria’s Waterfront Park commissioned by the City of Alexandria’s Office of the Arts. Since 2019 the Site See installations have played an important role in the success of Waterfront Park, providing engaging and interactive visual anchors that received accolades from the public and the press and drew thousands of visitors. For each installation, the Office of the Arts has commissioned original programming by local artists to activate the artwork and further engage the public with the artwork, including site specific dance and music performances, and a spoken word series The Site See temporary public art series highlights Waterfront Park as a civic space and is informed by the historic waterfront and neighboring community.
Additional Information
Excerpts from Washington Post: Art installation in Alexandria’s Waterfront Park is playful — and makes a point Alexandria’s Waterfront Park appears to be a peaceful spot, but it’s actually a battleground. And while most of the conflicts waged there are safely in the past, one is looming. This imminent struggle between the Potomac River and its banks is one of the implied subjects of “Groundswell,” a sculptural installation by Mark Reigelman. History aside, “Groundswell” simply outlines architectural space in a way people find appealing. The area is still open, yet feels divided into a succession of little rooms without walls, each chamber set off by the pillars. Visitors walk (or run) through the installation, finding themselves in a slightly new setting with just a few steps. Varying the heights of the posts has a similar effect. People sit (or stand) on them, enjoying the different — again, just slightly — vantage points. The mirrorlike discs atop each column add another element of crowd appeal. They reflect the sky, but also faces, hands and bodies. People can gaze at (or photograph) themselves within the simulated water. Their presence may not historic, but it, too, defines the space. By Mark Jenkins