This morning at 10 a.m., in partnership with Creative Time, 21c Museum Hotel Durham hoisted the seventh public artwork in the nationwide Pledges of Allegiance series, Fly Together by artist Ann Hamilton.
Fly Together incorporates recurring themes in Hamilton’s work — birds, indigo, suspensions, fabric, fragility, ephemerality, and thread — all elements that evoke questions of space, collective voice, communities past and labor present, memory, and imagination.
With two songbirds holding cloth between their beaks, Hamilton explores the potential made possible through our own mutual cooperation. She asks, “Using their mouths as we use our hands, perhaps they hold a piece of the sky? We see that to carry the cloth’s weight, to allow the cloth’s movement, they must hold with gentleness and tenacity. They must work and fly together.”
As part of 21c’s partnership with Creative Time, a new artist-designed flag will be installed at 21c Durham on the same day the flag is raised at Creative Time headquarters in New York City and at other partner sites throughout a six month period.
In a gesture of solidarity, the flag will be raised simultaneously at the following twelve locations: Creative Time headquarters at 59 E 4th Street in New York, NY; University of South Florida Contemporary Art Museum in Tampa, FL; Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD) in Detroit, MI; Herbert F Johnson Museum of Art at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY; KMAC Museum in Louisville, KY; RISD Museum at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence , RI; Ferrovia Studios in Kingston, NY; The Union for Contemporary Art in Omaha, NE; Zimmerli Art Museum, Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ; The Commons, in partnership with the Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas in Lawrence, KS; Texas State Galleries at Texas State University in San Marcos, TX; and 21c Museum Hotel in Durham, NC. Hamilton’s flag will fly for the remainder of the month before being replaced by the next Pledges of Allegiance flag.
> Learn more about the project
Image: 21c Museum Hotels presents Fly Together by artist Ann Hamilton, part of Creative Time’s Pledges of Allegiance. Pledges of Allegiance was originally conceived by Alix Browne and developed in collaboration with Cian Browne, Fabienne Stephan, and Opening Ceremony.
ABOUT ANN HAMILTON
ABOUT CREATIVE TIME
Creative Time, the New York based public arts non-profit, is committed to working with artists on the dialogues, debates, and dreams of our time. Creative Time presents the most innovative art in the public realm, providing new platforms to amplify artists’ voices, including the Creative Time Summit, an international conference convening at the intersection of art and social justice.
Since 1974, Creative Time has produced over 350 groundbreaking public art projects that ignite the imagination, explore ideas that shape society, and engage millions of people around the globe. Since its inception, the non-profit organization has been at the forefront of socially engaged public art, seeking to convert the power of artists’ ideas into works that inspire and challenge the public. Creative Time projects stimulate dialogue on timely issues, and initiate a dynamic experience between artists, sites, and audiences.
