Grounds For Sculpture facts for kids
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| Established | 1992 |
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| Location | Hamilton Township, NJ |
| Public transit access | From New York Penn Station, take NJ Transit to the Hamilton Station. From Philadelphia, take SEPTA to the Trenton Station. From there, take the 608 bus on the NJ Transit (one stop) to Hamilton. Taxi ride is 5 minutes to GFS. |
Grounds For Sculpture (GFS) is a special place in Hamilton Township, New Jersey. It's a big sculpture park and museum that covers about 42 acres. Imagine a huge outdoor art gallery! It was started in 1992 by a sculptor named John Seward Johnson II.
The main idea behind Grounds For Sculpture is to help people understand and enjoy modern art. They do this by showing amazing sculptures, creating helpful guides, and offering fun learning programs. It's a place where art comes to life in a beautiful outdoor setting. Since July 2000, GFS has been a non-profit organization. This means it's open to everyone and uses money from visitors, donations, and grants to keep running.
Contents
Discovering Grounds For Sculpture
How the Park Began
The idea for Grounds For Sculpture started in 1984. J. Seward Johnson, who was a sculptor and also helped many good causes, wanted to create a public sculpture garden. He wanted to make modern art easy for everyone to see and enjoy. He imagined a place where people from all walks of life could feel comfortable with contemporary art.
Construction on the park began in 1989. It was built on the land where the New Jersey State Fairgrounds used to be. Grounds For Sculpture officially opened its doors to the public in 1992.
Amazing Artworks to See
The park has sculptures by many famous artists. You can see works by Clement Meadmore, Anthony Caro, Beverly Pepper, and Kiki Smith. Other artists include Magdalena Abakanowicz, Boaz Vaadia, and New Jersey's own George Segal.
Some sculptures were made just for GFS. For example, Magdalena Abakanowicz created Space of Stone. Also, New Jersey artist Isaac Witkin made Garden State. The park has grown over the years. It now has more than 270 modern sculptures. Many of these are very large!
Besides the outdoor sculptures, GFS also has six indoor art galleries. The collection of art changes and grows all the time. You can always find the latest exhibits on the park's website.
Supporting the Park
Since 2000, Grounds For Sculpture has been a public non-profit group. A special Board of Trustees helps make sure the park runs well. Because it's a non-profit, GFS depends on support from visitors, art lovers, donations, and volunteers. This support helps them continue to offer all their programs and activities each year. GFS also helps local charities. For example, in 2016, they held a winter coat drive for Jersey Cares.
A Unique Art Experience
In 2013, a website called UntappedCities.com described Grounds for Sculpture as an "Impressionist Oasis in New Jersey." They said it was one of the most impressive sculpture gardens in the world.
one of the world’s most impressive sculpture gardens. While Grounds for Sculpture possesses a wide array of Modernist sculptures and manicured landscapes, they are far from what make it unique. As you’ll see below, Grounds for Sculpture is home to a bizarre set of sculptural recreations of Impressionist paintings.
This means the park has many modern sculptures and beautiful gardens. But what makes it truly special are the sculptures that look like famous Impressionist paintings.
Fun Events and Activities
In 2016, when the Pokémon Go game was very popular, GFS hosted "Catch 'Em All Tours." These tours were made just for Pokémon players! The museum even announced that it had forty PokéStops and four Pokémon gyms on its property. This made it a great place for players to explore and catch Pokémon.
In January 2017, the Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital at Hamilton and the Princeton Photography Club worked together. They held an exhibition to celebrate GFS. It showed how the park changed over time. The exhibit was called A Grounds For Sculpture History: The Land in Pictures and Words.
The works in the exhibit tell the story of how the former site of the New Jersey State Fairgrounds became Grounds For Sculpture, beginning in 1984 when the Atlantic Foundation purchased 12 acres of the old fairgrounds property adjacent to the Seward Johnson Atelier. From this site emerged founder Seward Johnson’s dream of a park that would become an oasis and respite for all visitors. His goal of creating a place where contemporary sculpture would be accessible to everyone continues today.
Famous Sculptures at GFS
In July 2013, it was announced that Seward Johnson's Forever Marilyn sculpture would move to GFS. This huge statue of Marilyn Monroe had been in Palm Springs, California. It was part of a special exhibit in 2014 that honored Johnson's work. The statue stayed at GFS until September 2015.
Another famous sculpture by Johnson, called Unconditional Surrender, was also on display. This 25-foot tall sculpture looks like the famous V-J Day in Times Square photograph. That picture was taken during the celebration of Victory over Japan Day in Times Square.
Rat's Restaurant
There's a restaurant called Rat's Restaurant right inside Grounds For Sculpture. Seward Johnson designed it to feel like an Impressionist painting, especially like the work of Claude Monet. The area around the restaurant is beautiful. It has Johnson's own sculptures inspired by Impressionist art. There's even a bridge over a lily pond, just like in Monet's famous painting Water Lilies and Japanese Bridge.
The restaurant is named after "Ratty," a character from The Wind in the Willows. This book by Kenneth Grahame is one of Seward Johnson's favorite stories.
Gallery
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