Today was the last day of summer, and I spent it cleaning the sculptures in The Baltimore Museum of Art’s sculpture garden. We met early in the morning and washed a few bronze statues in the upper garden, first with water only then with water mixed with Orvus, a synthetic biodegradable detergent. Before rinsing them, the Orvus-soaked suds clung to the sculptures’ surfaces, making them appear as though dusted with snow.
After lunch, we moved to the lower garden where the sculptures are mostly abstract and made of painted steel. My colleague Rob and I were tasked with washing Sister Lu (1978), a large sculpture by Mark di Suvero consisting of several interlocking I-beams, the kind used in constructing skyscrapers. Sister Lu is abstract, meaning it’s not supposed to evoke anything outside of itself. Yet a long diagonal beam with a sort of bucket hanging from its end makes it look like a giant catapult in mid-launch. Perhaps the artist intended this reading. Regardless, di Suvero’s Sister Lu conveys a powerful kinetic energy.
We weren’t there to interpret art though; we were there to wash it. But when we turned on the water, nothing came out. We tried several different hoses and even changed spigots, but it was no use: no water was forthcoming. Rob and I were confounded. I went into the lobby and asked the guard stationed there if he knew whether or not anyone was using water somewhere else on the museum grounds. He radioed facilities and I went back outside to wait with Rob. After a few minutes, someone from facilities arrived and asked us what the problem was. We explained to him that the water wasn’t working. He opened a nearby manhole cover, flipped a switch, and all of a sudden water came gushing out of the end of the hose.
We were back in business. But just as we started to wash the di Suvero, the automatic sprinkler system turned on. All of a sudden half a dozen sprinklers, all aimed at Sister Lu – with us in the crossfire – began spraying us from head to toe. We tried to maneuver around them, but they kept cycling back and forth, spitting water at us in their rhythmic spurts from all directions. We’d dash one way only to be hit in the back from another angle. It was hopeless. We were getting soaked and now had more water than we knew what to do with!
Then something sort of magical happened. The sunlight hit the spray at an angle, creating several arcs of rainbow that moved in sync with the sprinklers as they doused us. I was transported to my youth when my younger brother and I’d run back and forth over a sprinkler on hot summer days. I then started laughing and didn’t feel so bad that Rob and I were getting drenched. The sprinklers turned off after a few minutes and we finished washing Sister Lu. What a great way to end the summer.
Rob washing Sister Lu after the sprinklers soaked us from head to toe.
