Desert Rooftops is a 5,000-square-foot sculpture by artist David Brooks that was recently installed in Times Square that is an a configuration of multiple asphalt shingled rooftops similar to those on suburban developments, new houses, and strip malls. The roofs are built close together, and create a landscape of rooftops, or a image of rolling asphalt dunes or hills.
The piece raises questions issues of the natural and built landscape, and uses humor to present issues about suburban and urban sprawl. The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification defines desertification as: land degradation into arid and dry sub-humid areas resulting from various factors, including human activities and climatic variations derived from over-development, over-grazing and an overworked land. The result is often a depleted landscape inhospitable to other life.
Brooks investigates this idea as it applies to housing communities, which devour more and more land and resources each year. By definition, the outcome is equivalent to this very process of desertification.
The Last Lot is a short term donation to Art Production Fund from The Shubert Organization, and is part of the Times Square Alliance’s public art program that works to bring cutting-edge art to Times Square.
The piece will be on view The Last Lot, (46th Street & 8th Avenue) until February 5th, 2012.
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