Nancy Rubins, born in Naples, Texas, and now living and working in Topanga Canyon, California, has been creating gigantic sculptural installations since the early ’80s using various discarded objects such as airplane parts and cut-up boats. She has exhibited her work at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, and the Cartier Foundation in Paris, among other institutions. In 2006, she completed commissioned works for Lincoln Center and the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art. Her work at the 1993 Whitney Biennial, 10,000 pounds of mattresses twisted and bound together, suspended from the ceiling and bejeweled with 1,000 pounds of cake, careened into space with a dynamic energy to create an unforgettable visual and olfactory experience. Rubins’s recent installation at the SculptureCenter, MoMA and Airplane Parts 1995 that visited Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain 2002/2003, then visited Forte Belvedere in 2003 and is now at Sculpture Center, was on view last fall.
