Untitled (drone) | The High Line
High Line Art presents the second High Line Plinth commission, Untitled (drone) by artist Sam Durant. This large-scale fiberglass sculpture in the shape of an abstracted drone atop a 25-foot-tall steel pole continues High Line Art’s mission of presenting new, powerful, thought-provoking artworks that generate and amplify some of today’s most important conversations.
With this work, Durant seeks to make visible the intentionally obscured drone warfare perpetuated by the US, and to remind the public that drones and surveillance are a tragic and pervasive presence in the daily lives of many living outside—and within—the United States. Since it was selected over three years ago, Untitled (drone) has only increased in relevance. Over the past months, we have witnessed not only an escalation in international drone warfare but also a vertiginous increase in domestic surveillance carried out by military drones employed by US Customs and Border Protection and ongoing surveillance of activists by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and local law enforcement agencies. At the same time, drones are employed daily for humanitarian purposes, such as delivering supplies and medicine to isolated locations, to survey mine fields, and to tame wild fires that have ravaged landscapes.
Along with Simone Leigh’s Brick House, which has been displayed since 2019, Durant’s work was selected from a shortlist of 12 artworks—narrowed from over 50 total submissions—proposed in 2016 for the first and second High Line Plinth commissions.
