Aby Rosen, real estate developer, art collector and owner of the
A. Conger Goodyear house in Old Westbury has stirred up controversy after the installation of a 33 foot tall
Damien Hirst statue titled
The Virgin Mother on the estate grounds.
The mayor of Old Westbury, Fred Carillo, has called it "out of character with the neighborhood" because the neighbors "have to preserve their bucolic views". This is the same mayor who has overseen the wholesale destruction of anything historic in Old Westbury. Frankly I am shocked that this guy is the mayor, but now I understand why Old Westbury looks like it does.
Leaving aside the fact that Aby Rosen saved the Goodyear house and chose to make it a place to house part of his art collection, any neighborhood should be lucky to have a resident like that in their community who could afford a Damien Hirst statue that some people are lucky enough to see from their houses. How anyone can claim this statue is "graphic" given what is on basic cable and the internet in this day and age is truly insane (I see more graphic stuff walking down Sixth Avenue in Manhattan). Clearly there are residents of Old Westbury who have little appreciation for art, including the guy who calls himself the mayor.
My suggestion to them is this: Old Westbury has been butchered by developers in coordination with the Village of Old Westbury for years. The notion that this statue destroys bucolic views is utterly absurd. What has destroyed Old Westbury's bucolic views are the actions of Fred Carillo. If the statue really offends you...don't look at it. This is a Nontroversy.
Click
HERE to see the story on CBS News and
HERE for the Daily News story.
And just for a bit of historical perspective, Wheatley Road (along which the Goodyear estate sits) was home to sculptors
Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and
Charles Cary Rumsey (not to mention the Goodyear house itself was built for the founder of MoMA). The irony is thick.
The estate of Charles Cary Rumsey, designed by F. Burrall Hoffman Jr. c. 1910 in Brookville. Rumsey was a noted sculptor and polo player (rated at 8 goals) and was married to Mary Harriman, the daughter of E.H. Harriman (one of the era's bigger railroad tycoons). Much of Rumsey's artwork was done for associates including H.P. Whitney and August Belmont. Click HERE to see a selection of Rumsey's statues. He was a childhood friend of one of the country's best polo players, Devereux Milburn, and was known as 'Pad' Rumsey on the polo field. In September 1922 Rumsey took a car ride home from NYC along with two friends. As they were passing a car on Jericho Turnpike which included Mr. & Mrs. Lathrop Brown (of 'Land of Clover' in St. James), something happened which caused the car to clip the Brown's auto, hit an abutment and spin around backwards. In the midst of the chaos Rumsey and one of his friends (neither were driving) were thrown out of the car (Rumsey hit the abutment before the ground). He was dead a short while later. His brother-in-law W. Averell Harriman and friend Devereux Milburn went to Floral Park, the site of the accident, to collect Rumsey's body. The estate was later owned by Dr. Fulton Cutting who hired Peabody, Wilson and Brown to design alterations c. 1930. Click HERE to see the Charles Cary Rumsey estate on google earth.
Pictures from Architectural Record, 1917.
