Louisiana’s regional ecology shapes a unique garden itinerary for experiencing contemporary sculpture

RH Besthoff Sculpture Garden EWING 6244 2 XZ EDIT

New Orleans Museum of Art Besthoff Sculpture Garden

New Orleans, Louisiana

The Besthoff Sculpture Garden Expansion at the New Orleans Museum of Art exemplifies a shifting paradigm for sculpture garden design and elevates the critical dialogue between art, landscape, and human experience. The expanded sculpture garden embraces the dynamic qualities of this watery landscape as both a subject for art and model of high-performing resiliency. This Garden proclaims the beauty of the unique regional landscape, provides a bold framework in which new artworks can be commissioned, and stimulates observers to reimagine their relationships with art, their community, and their changing environment.

2693 N150 — Extensive lagoon reshaping enhanced ecological performance and created an expanse of open water, reflecting sky, plants, and art in dynamic ways.

2693 N12 — Water, tree canopy, and circulation —the building blocks of City Park—join to shape a one-of-a-kind experience of art within the Louisiana landscape.

Painting by Alexander Drysdale The Garden evokes atmospheric qualities of Louisiana - humid, hazy, immersive and wild - both as it is experienced and visually represented in art.

2693 N155 — The pervasive tree canopy creates cooling shade, frames views and defines thresholds between spaces. Rescued from lagoon erosion,150+ year-old Live Oaks frame an expansive, horizontal space beneath their canopy for art, with views to the park beyond.

Experiencing Sculpture

Within the garden, exemplifying the resiliency of the native landscape, sculpture remains the primary purpose. The collection features work from a diverse group of artists. Each piece is carefully sited to create a series of relationships between art, environment, and observer. Two commissioned works (Elyn Zimmerman's Mississippi Meanders and Terrisita Fernandez's Mayombe Mississippi)) integrate artistic expression into essential garden infrastructure, strengthening a sense of place as artist and landscape architect collaborated on siting and detailing of the works.

2693 N152 wb — Itineraries through the Garden place the visitor in dialogue between works in the collection and plants, deepening connections to this landscape.

2693 N163 wb — The project grows the Garden by 6.5 acres, increasing free, public access to a collection of over 90 world-class sculptures and site-specific works. The sculpted amphitheater is a venue for the community to come together around performance, wellness, and art education in the shade of Slash Pines.

Elyn Zimmerman, Mississippi Meanders, 2019

1 In the City Park tradition, artist, landscape architect, and architect collaborated to design site-specific works, including Zimmerman’s glass bridge.
2 The bridge’s design motif was inspired by the historic Harold Fisk Maps of the meandering courses of the Mississippi River.
3 The Artist, Client and Design Team collaborated execute the design concept and review full-scale mockups.
4 The glass bridge panels were installed individually with a crane on site.

Creating Environments for Art

The collection engages the site’s many environs - reflected in water, under mature canopy, across open lawn, on cypress islands, and in understory.

Baltasar Lobo, Grande jeune fille a genouox, 1987, cast 1994

Reclaiming the Regional Palette

In contrast to the earlier phase of the sculpture garden, which is characterized by a traditional cultivated and enclosed understory and a series of gallery-like rooms, we sought a more indigenous character for the expansion, one inspired by Louisiana’s bayou and lowland ecologies. The Garden emphasizes the spatial characteristics of the delta as found in nature and long represented in regional art: sweeping horizontal spaces with blurred edges that evoke the drenched heat of the swampland. The regional character of the landscape helps break down barriers as a message of welcome to all.

The Garden’s planting concept emphasizes the spatial characteristics of the delta as found in nature and long represented in regional art: sweeping horizontal spaces with blurred edges that evoke the drenched heat of the swampland.

2693 N167 — An arcing boardwalk skims the top of constructed cypress islands, engaging the edge between land and water as a unique part of the visitor experience.

Bridges, boardwalks, and paths devise a shifting relationship with the water’s edge, highlighting NOLA’s dynamic relationship between water and land.

Over, Under, and Through

The circulation weaves over, under, and through the site; bending the paths around branches and roots as if they grew there naturally among the trees. The lagoon was carefully sculpted to exaggerate the expansiveness of the delta, visually connect the upper and lower lagoons, and maximize land for sculpture and a new gallery pavilion. Select moments dramatize the dynamic aspects of the resilient and functioning ecosystem. The most evident of these is the canal bridge, which connects the original 2003 first phase to the expansion, and provides a novel experience of stepping into the lagoon. The thin edge wall evokes the city’s relationship to water, a reminder of climate risk.

The park has historically featured three intertwined systems of canopy, water, and circulation.

2693 N202 — The canal bridge creates an experience of walking through the lagoon, linking the gardens and highlighting the region’s tenuous relationship to water.

2693 N183 — A system of swales and constructed islands slow and filter runoff; a new weir controls water levels to alleviate flood risk throughout City Park.

The Canal Bridge

1 Inspired by the system of pumps and canals throughout the city, the 300 foot long bridge is calibrated to the weir elevation and is designed to flood.
2 Conceptual design of the canal bridge and boardwalk over cypress islands in the background
3 The lagoon was drained and dredged to facilitate construction.
4 The canal bridge provides a novel experience of stepping into the lagoon. The thin edge wall evokes the city’s relationship to water.

Year

2014–2019

Size

6.5 acres

Client

New Orleans Museum of Art

Services

Full Design

Team

Doug ReedJohn KettLeslie CarterLydia Gikas Cook

Collaborators

Architects

Lee Ledbetter & Associates

Artists

Elyn Zimmerman

Contractors

Mullin LandscapeRNDG

Ecologists

Pastorek Habitats

Engineers

AltieriEdward Stanley EngineersSherwood Design Engineers

Irrigation Designers

Aqueous Consultants LLC

Lighting Designers

Lam Partners Inc

Soils Scientists

Pine & Swallow Environmental

Awards

Merit Award for Design

Boston Society of Landscape Architects

, 2021

2021

Press

The New Orleans Museum of Art flaunts its waterside sculpture garden

The Architect’s Newspaper

, 2019

2019

NOMA sculpture garden extension features outdoor theatre and submerged walkway

Dezeen

, 2019

2019

“New Orleans Museum of Art Unveils 6.5-Acre Sculpture Garden Expansion”

Metropolis

, 2019

2019