Floating Sculptural Installation by Daniel Rothbart '90 On View at Snug Harbor in Staten Island
Animated by wind and water, vague organic forms dance across the pond's green surface.
The public art installation by Visual Arts alum Daniel Rothbart '90, Serpentine Sibyls, is distinct from other outdoor works: it floats freely in the pond adjacent to the Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art and in reflecting pools that flank the Glass House at Snug Harbor Cultural Center & Botanical Garden on Staten Island.
A series of sculptural forms that inhabit the water as both contemporary artworks and mythological presences, the installation takes its title from sibyls, ancient female prophetesses and oracles consulted in times of crisis. Some forms resemble spindly fish, while others call to mind many-sphered chains of protozoa. Primordial and speculative, the forms engage themes of ecology, maritime history, and prophecy, nodding to Snug Harbor's history as a charitable haven for sailors as well as gesturing toward the uncertain future of the landscape.
The free installation is on view at Snug Harbor culture park July 11–September 28, 2026, during park hours (8 AM–6 PM).
A multidisciplinary artist and writer, Rothbart is the author of three books: Jewish Metaphysics as Generative Principle in American Art (Ulisse & Calipso, 1994), The Story of the Phoenix (Ulisse & Calipso, 1999), and Seeing Naples: Reports from the Shadow of Vesuvius (Edgewise, 2018). He has collaborated with the poet Richard Milazzo on a book of poems and collages called More Fugitive Than Light: Poems of Rome, Venice, Paris, 2016-2017 (Tsukuda Island Press, 2024) and contributed an essay and four commentaries on the theme of water-based performance for PAJ: A Journal of Performance and Art 111 (MIT Press, 2015).
Rothbart's studio projects include RamleAnthropocence, the Pool of the Arches / Center for Contemporary Art Ramle CACR, Ramle, Israel; Water Clocks, Hudson River / The Hudson Eye, Hudson, New York; Flotilla, Oakdale Lake, Hudson, New York; Inscrutable Theologies, Saint Elisabeth Church / KUNSTWECHSEL, Aachen, Germany; STREAMING II, The Frank Institute @ CR10, Linlithgo, New York; The Rumsey Street Project, Grand Rapids, Michigan; Air de Venise, Venice, Italy; and WATERLINES, Galerie Depardieu, Nice, France. He has exhibited in Ventisette artisti e una rivista, Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna, Rome, Italy; Citydrift, Momenta Art, Brooklyn, New York; But I’m an American, Belgrade Cultural Centre, Belgrade, Serbia; End of Language: Wittgenstein Reimagined, Museum of Contemporary Art Belgrade MoCAB, Belgrade, Serbia; and Meditation | Mediation, Life is Art Foundation, New Orleans, Louisiana. His work can be found in public and private collections, including the Artist’s Book Collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Rothbart was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship in Naples, Italy, a New York State Council on the Arts grant, a New York Foundation for the Arts grant, along with residencies at the Artists' Residence Herzliya, Herzliya, Israel, in 2023 and La Napoule Art Foundation, Mandelieu-la-Napoule, France, in 2002. His work is the subject of a monograph by Enrico Pedrini published in 2010 by Ulisse e Calipso of Naples, Italy.