COMPLETED
2023

LOCATION
American University Washington, DC

PRIMARY MATERIALS
Concrete paving
Natural cleft and polished granite boulders
Water
Adjacent landscaping

CONSULTANTS
Lee & Associates Landscape Architects
Davis Construction
Rugo Stone
Fountain Craft

PHOTOS
All photos from the second down
by Alan Karchmer

Sudama’s reveal on AU’s campus completes a journey that began in downtown Washington, DC. The work, originally titled Marabar, was commissioned for the plaza outside the National Geographic Society’s downtown headquarters in 1981 with the one caveat from the NGS that the plaza design was to feature rocks and water. Inspiration came from the rock cut caves of India following travel there in 1977, and in reading E. M. Forster’s novel A Passage to India (1924). Forster describes the fictional Marabar Caves which were actually based on the real, ancient Barabar Caves in northeast India. The most prominent of these caves is named Sudama and was created over 3000 years ago.

“The Caves, with their rough natural exteriors and highly polished interiors, became my solution to the project—not as caves but as massive rough granite rocks with one, sometimes two, mirror-polished sides—to look as if a gigantic geode had been cracked open to straddle the 60-foot-long pool of water,” Zimmerman says. From its completion in 1984, the work remained an iconic fixture in front of the National Geographic Society’s headquarters until 2022 when it was reinvented for the American University site.

The AU site is totally different from the National Geographic headquarters. Instead of a rectangular narrow granite plaza between buildings, the new location is a large oval space with grass and trees. "I responded to the difference by making the pool longer and crescent shaped and adjusting the relationships of the large rocks to the changed form of the pool”. - from American University Newsletter

COMPLETED 2019

LOCATION
Sydney & Walda Besthoff Sculpture Garden at the New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans, LA

SITE DESCRIPTION
This 6.5 acre garden is an addition to the existing 5 acre Besthoff Sculpture Garden at NOMA completed in 2003. The new garden is bisected by a 2 acre lagoon and Mississippi Meanders is one of 3 bridges that cross parts of the lagoon to connect the sculpture garden’s walking paths. The glass bridge is 70’ long and 6’ wide.

PRIMARY MATERIALS
Laminated tempered glass, ceramic frit, aluminum and steel supports.

COMMISSIONED BY
New Orleans Museum of Art and Sydney and Walda Besthoff

CONSULTANTS
Reed Hilderbrand landscape architects; Ed Stanley & Associates structural engineers; William Logan/Vidaris glass engineer; JEI glass engineer; Pulp Studios glass panel fabricators; Palmisano Construction installation.

A collaborative effort by Zimmerman and Gail Wittwer-Laird of the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, Albert Capsouto Park is a landscaped one-acre site defined by a 120-long by 10-foot-wide stone and water “canal.” Titled Canal Waterworks,  it refers to the canal that was once located there when New York City was contained in the area known as 5 Corners.

The park is located at the intersection of Canal, Varick, and Laight Streets in Tribeca. Engraved panels at each of its three entrances describe the history of the site from early settlement to current times. It was named to honor Albert Capsouto,  a Tribeca resident who, over the past 30 years, became an important figure in the growth of Tribeca.

The park is designed around Zimmerman’s water feature. The Canal and Laight Street entrance, on the east side of the park, is near the termination of the 'canal' steps. The Varick and Canal Street entrance at the northwestern corner of the park is where the watercourse starts. A stone ‘tank,’ 12 feet high by 12 feet wide, feeds the cascading waterworks and is reminiscent of historic water tanks. The location of the course, paralleling Canal Street, honors the history of the site and is the linear spine for the curvilinear planting beds designed by the artist and Witter-Laird.

At any given time the park is used by divergent groups of people. In the park the din of traffic is muffled by the waterfalls, and one can sit alone or with friends in the landscape and escape the visual and aural bombardment that define both the vibrancy and sometimes over-whelming nature of the city.

The sidewalks along the park exterior are lined with typical New York City street trees. Inside the park, flowering shrubs border the paved walkways and smaller, understory trees run along the sides of interior planting beds. These planted areas surround benches as well as tables and other site amenities.

COMPLETED 2010
LOCATION
One acre triangular lot in Tribeca, NYC.  Bordered by 6th Avenue, Canal Street, Varick Street
SITE DESCRIPTION
Developed to add new park to Tribeca. The main feature is a 120’ long x 10’ wide granite “canal” and waterfall fountain. Landscaping and multiple seating areas surround it.
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite, water, landscaping and park amenities
COMMISSIONED BY
New York City Art Commission and New York City Department of Parks & Recreation; additional funding by Paul Milstein Foundation. 
CONSULTANTS
New York City Department of Parks & Recreation, project manager Gail Wittwer-Laird;
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

Watercourse, commissioned by the Vancouver Art Commission and the Bentall Development Corporation, comprises nearly an entire city block in the heart of downtown Vancouver at a major intersection in the center of the city. In her research of Vancouver’s history, Zimmerman found that in the past, before modern development, streams crossed in front of the new building site and ran down along the site to the harbor just a few blocks north. The water elements in this project refer to that history.

Zimmerman’s idea was to have water flow all along the site from the south to the north end, like the primal streams. The grade changes on the site are significant.  The plaza's south end can be accessed at sidewalk level. Mid-block however, numerous stairs are needed to go up to the plaza and the building entrance. The intention was for these stairs to appear to be a bridge over the water flowing alongside the front of the plaza. The artist’s solution resulted in an elegant project that defines the experience of the entire street whether as a pedestrian, or in a vehicle, or as a visitor to the buildings.

The abundantly flowing water and natural cleft granite water walls that constitute Watercourse provide a vibrant counterpart to the geometry of the urban high-rise structures that surround it.


COMPLETED 2008
LOCATION
Vancouver, BC Canada
SITE DESCRIPTION
New tower building occupies center city block creating wide plaza with landscaping and fountain. Plaza is edged by block-long water wall with continuous pool
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Canadian granite, water, and landscaping
COMMISSIONED BY
Vancouver Art Commission and Bentall Development Corporation
CONSULTANTS
Architects: Musson Cattell Mackey Partnership;
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

If at first glance Suspended Arcs looks like a reprise of Scholar’s Rock, that is because the Olympic Art commissioning body had seen, admired, and made it clear that they wanted a project similar in form to Scholar’s Rock. Zimmerman, while using an analogous vocabulary of materials for years, prided herself on not repeating the forms of her sculptures and resisted working up a reiteration of her other work. However, she came to understand that the circumstances here were complicated: the Olympic Art Committee chose twenty international artists to make work for various Olympic venues. All of these artists were selected on the basis of works they had previously created because the committee had to calculate ahead of time how much space each work would require and how much fabrication time to expect. Zimmerman explained, “As it turned out, making this project was a positive experience. Just to be in Beijing during the Olympic construction period and to see the contemporary art explosion and all the new architecture being created was very exciting…”

Another requirement of the commission was that the work had to be fabricated entirely in China using Chinese materials. Working through an interpreter at the fabrication site just outside of Beijing, it was clear that although Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) conditions were not in effect in the Chinese compounds, the workers were extremely competent and respectful of the design as well as of the artist. Zimmerman summed up her experience: “I think given the time pressures and mixing of materials—steel and stone—the fabrication of the piece and placement in the park worked very well and in the end it became a popular site.” 


COMPLETED 2008
LOCATION
Olympic Park, Beijing, China
SITE DESCRIPTION
New park in Beijing city center
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Chinese granite and stainless steel
COMMISSIONED BY
2008 Olympic Art Committee

At the time Zimmerman was commissioned by the board of directors to create a work to mark the 75th anniversary of the Institute for Advanced Study, she had been visiting the campus regularly for almost two years because her husband was a faculty member there. The commemorative nature of the commission is obvious only in the quotes engraved into the vertical sides of each bench. These were selected by the Institute directors from the writings of three important figures in its history: Abraham Flexner, its first director (1930–1939), “Those who have moved the world have usually been those who have followed the will-o’-the-wisp of their own intellectual and spiritual curiosity”; Albert Einstein, one of its first faculty members (1933–1935, School of Mathematics), “All our science, measured against reality, is primitive and childlike – and yet it is the most precious thing we have”; and George F. Kennan, faculty member (1956–2005, School of Historical Studies), “True scholars often work in loneliness, compelled to find reward in the awareness that they have made valuable, even beautiful, contributions to the cumulative structure of human knowledge, whether anyone knows it at the time or not.”

Scholar’s Rock is located along the south edge of the large pond situated in the Institute’s handsome and well-maintained landscape cum sculpture garden. It is at the entrance to the Institute’s popular 300-acre nature preserve with it's extensive walking trails.

Zimmerman created the illusion of a 50-foot-long linear floating bench when viewed from the main campus looking across the water from the center of the IAS campus. The curved, granite benches are invisibly supported by numerous powder-coated stainless steel poles that vary slightly in width, color, and height. They were inspired by and suggest the surrounding tree trunks both in their height and shape, and in the shadows they cast. 


COMPLETED 2005
LOCATION
Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ
SITE DESCRIPTION
Along the edge of a large pond at the IAS  campus,
50’l x 3’w granite bench with inscriptions is “suspended” by forest or stainless steel poles;
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite and powder-coated stainless steel
COMMISSIONED BY
Institute for Advanced Study
CONSULTANTS
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company

Following the destruction of the U.S. Embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania in 1998, it was rebuilt at a distant, more secure site. The Foundation for Art and Preservation of Embassies (FAPE) and the U.S. State Department commissioned Zimmerman to create a sculpture for the formal entrance to the new building. FAPE’s Professional Fine Arts Committee has selected some of the best-known artists in the field to provide works for our embassies—among them Louise Bourgeois, Ellsworth Kelly, Sol LeWitt, Maya Lin, Martin Puryear, and Joel Shapiro.

For Assembly of Friends, (Nkuanyiko Wa Marifiki, in Swahili), Zimmerman extended a sandstone-lined water channel that was originally designed by the building’s architect to course through the large garden adjacent to the main embassy building. She centered the origin of the watercourse in the embassy’s entry court and made it into a round pool surrounded by six granite panels, each 3 feet wide by 8 feet high by 8 inches deep. The panels are uniquely shaped to suggest traditional African forms—shields, scepters, dooways—and their surfaces are textured with hand-drawn patterns sandblasted onto the stone, deliberately evocative of the scarred surfaces of many African artifacts. Zimmerman’s intention was to suggest village wells that traditionally served as peaceful gathering places. As Agnes Gund observed in an interview posted by FAPE on The Huffington Post: “The piece is well understood as a reference to the past and to a peaceful future.”

As in most of her public commissions, Zimmerman worked with local contractors using local materials. Zimmerman’s site specificity here reinterprets historical African art into contemporary visual form. Assembly of Friends signals a meeting place linked to African traditions but now a meeting place used for issues of both local and international impact. 


COMPLETED 2004
LOCATION
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
SITE DESCRIPTION
Six 8’h x 3’w x 8”d granite panels surround fountain leading to 200-foot watercourse at entry court of US Embassy
PRIMARY MATERIALS
African granite, sandstone, and water
COMMISSIONED BY
U.S. State Department and Foundation for Art and Preservation of Embassies
CONSULTANTS
Architects: Duncan Lyons of Hellmuth, Obata + Kassabaum
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company;
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

Free Fall, at the Cancer Institute of New Jersey, is designed to be visible from street level, the entry drive, and most important from the reception room inside the new building. During her personal experiences visiting her husband’s cancer treatment hospital, Zimmerman was struck both by the levels of anxiety and stress they typically engender as well as the absence of a quiet, calm place for visitors to sit. It was her intention to have this project provide the waiting room with the sense of “a place apart.”

The tall, solid blocks of natural cleft granite convey the rugged forms and power of the ancient sites that Zimmerman’s work often evokes. Situated in circular pools and connected by vertical water cascades and small horizontal pools, they offer a distinct waterscape experience. Parallel to the building’s edge, they echo both its geometric elements and the color of its materials. Although the siting of Free Fall does not allow for direct contact with the water, one can engage in the movement and changes of the waterfall by walking along the entry path or by gazing out of the glass wall that defines the length of the waiting room.

COMPLETED 2004
SITE DESCRIPTION
Granite pillars 8’h x 4w x 4d and four pools interconnected with water cascade on a steeply sloping site alongside hospital entrance.
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite and water.  Landscaping by others
COMMISSIONED BY
New Jersey Arts Commission
CONSULTANTS
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

When executives at Allianz Global Insurance saw Zimmerman’s new work Intersection at the Gagosian Gallery in Beverly Hills, they decided something like it would be perfect for the entry to their headquarters in Burbank, CA.  For the exhibition in 1998, Zimmerman wanted to work with sedimentary stone, a “warmer” rock than the igneous granite with which she usually works. She chose red sandstone from Arizona. Following her usual practice to work directly at quarries to select the stone for each project, Zimmerman went near the Grand Canyon, the site of the sandstone quarry. Zimmerman immerses herself in the geological nature of the quarry sites she uses.  There is something absolutely integral about the choice of materials that stems from her understanding of their origin. 

The shape and scale of the entry drive at New Allianz corporate headquarters required that Zimmerman change the configuration of the stone panels that formed Intersection. This new arrangement prompted memories of her visit to the ancient stones at Morbihan in Brittany, a site that predates Stonehenge. Adapting the form of Intersection to this site presented an unusual challenge but was clearly an opportunity to create a new work out of existing materials. The piece now titled Roundabout provides an entry to the headquarters, as well as a sheltered seating area.


COMPLETED 2002
LOCATION
Allianz Headquarters, Burbank, CA
SITE DESCRIPTION
300-foot-diameter entry court
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Sandstone blocks and grasses
COMMISSIONED BY
City of Burbank and Empire Center Development Corporation

“ On February 26, 1993, a bomb set by terrorists exploded below this site. This horrible act of violence killed innocent people, injured thousands, and made victims of us all.”  

This inscription, at the center of the memorial fountain, hints at the devastating effects of the bombing. To  commemorate the loss of lives, and the loss of New York City’s confidence, The Port Authority of New York &  New Jersey issued a call for designs for a memorial—more than 2,000 artists, architects, and other design professionals responded.

The memorial is placed directly above the site of the bombing in the parking garage below grade. It is located directly between Tower 1 and Tower 2, the site selected by the terrorists as likely to damage both towers at once. It is not accidental that seen from above, the image of the memorial fountain and its surrounds is that of a bull’s eye.

Seen on the plaza the circular fountain recalls ancient tumulus markers with its fractured white granite walls. These walls enclose a shallow pool that collects water flowing from the red granite drum—the center of the fountain. It is around this drum that the inscription above is installed both in English and Spanish, and it lists the names of the World Trade Center employees who lost their lives.

The hundreds of tons of the granite used in this memorial were disintegrated in the 9/11 disaster. But amazingly one fragment of the inscribed disc was found and is installed in the 9/11 Memorial Museum.


COMPLETED 1995
LOCATION
New York City, NY
SITE DESCRIPTION
World Trade Center plaza between Tower 1 and Tower 2 above actual bombsite; 30-foot-diameter fountain structure
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite, water, and paving
SPONSOR
Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Art Commission
CONSULTANTS
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

Almost 50 years ago, AT&T constructed their headquarters on 140 acres in Basking Ridge, New Jersey. This corporate base came to occupy 2.7 million square feet of office space surrounded by superbly designed landscaping that hosted world-class sculpture as well as a private helipad.

In 1992, the corporation’s art consultant approached Zimmerman to create a “gathering place” for a half-acre courtyard set within the newly designed conference center. The director of the new center explained that visitors would be attending screenings or lectures in the multiple lecture halls that surrounded the courtyard on three sides. (A cafeteria is on the fourth side.) She was asked to create an outdoor seating area/fountain for the visitors to use and enjoy between meetings and lectures.

Zimmerman’s 30-foot-diameter project is set off center in the enclosed garden, which was landscaped by others. It has various seating options to accommodate both multiple groups of people or a solitary person taking a break from the conference center activities. There is seating at ground level around the piece near the fountain edge and upper-level seating on the inside and outside edges of the circular area.

The fountain is constructed of large granite boulders—the center block weighs 34 tons—cut to fit together. The water flow is strong and persistent to create an aural surround.


COMPLETED 1994
LOCATION
AT&T Headquaters & Conference Center, Basking Ridge, NJ
SITE DESCRIPTION
30 foot diameter water feature including multilevel seating, waterfall and pool
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite, water
SPONSOR
AT&T Corporation
CONSULTANTS
Stone supply fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

At 30,000 square feet, this new sculpture garden approaches the size of a football field. Its multi-level form was conceived by Zimmerman and was refined and developed by the artist in collaboration with the building’s architect, Edward Larrabee Barnes and project director Anne Wattenberg. The sculpture garden is divided into three distinct spaces: the Red Mountain Garden, with two specially commissioned tile pools; the Lower Gallery; and the Upper Plaza. These divisions allow for different exhibitions to occur at the same time without visually conflicting with one another.

Red Mountain Garden was the museum’s original garden and was used and will continue to be used for openings and social events. Its bluestone terrace is suited to display small-cale sculpture from the museum’s collection: Rodin, Hepworth, and Botero.

The Lower Gallery, 41 feet wide by 90 feet long, is an outdoor room that has a special gravel floor underlaid with drains and water taps, and the walls have sources for electricity. It can be used for traditional sculpture display or for temporary multimedia installations and fountains.

The Upper Plaza has access from the Red Mountain Garden and from the new contemporary galleries inside the museum. It is a huge space to accommodate large-scale sculptures and is designed to support extremely heavy loads. The oversize granite pavers cover an electric grid that artists can access if needed.

Zimmerman’s idea was to make these spaces as flexible as possible to allow very new and media-oriented works to be displayed as well as large-scale contemporary object sculptures.

The eastern edge of the Upper Plaza is enclosed by Zimmerman’s Lithos II, a monumental water wall and pool of textured and polished granites. The forms reflect the stratifications in the quarry walls the artist visited near Birmingham. The bands of colored rock were deformed over time into dramatic shapes and surfaces. Lithos II was inspired by these formations.


COMPLETED 1993
LOCATION
Birmingham, AL
SITE DESCRIPTION
120-foot-wide x 300-foot-long tri-level plaza
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite, water, and landscape materials
COMMISSIONED BY
Birmingham Museum of Art                            
CONSULTANTS
Architect: Edward Larabee Barnes & Anne Wattenburg
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company;  
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

To create a new public plaza on Market Street, the east-west center line of San Francisco, provided Zimmerman with an important opportunity for a civic project.  But this was a highly complicated site on which to build: under Market Street is the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system and the Hetch Hetchy reservoir pipelines, as well as street drains, electrical vaults, and utility lines common to most streets.

Tishman Speyer, owners of the building at 525 Market Street, and Zimmerman had to navigate the elaborate and detailed city council and San Francisco Arts Commission requirements and their many meetings and inspections. The site requirements included a fountain, extensive seating in all parts of the plaza, and not moving the existing large stairway to the upper level. This was in lieu of allowing Tishman Speyer to include the decommissioned alley on the west side of the property into the new plaza. Zimmerman’s solution for the project was to create a series of outdoor rooms to accommodate the eccentric footprint of the new plaza.

During the construction of the project, the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake occured. Everything that had been built was torn down and re-engineered to more stringent standards as that part of the city had suffered devastating destruction.

The completed project includes an area fronting Market Street with lush plantings in semi-circular plant beds. These structures have seating on both sides. Along the street face there is a semi-circular landscape area large enough to include trees and shrubs. The two granite-block waterwalls face one another to make the largest of the “rooms.” Seating is provided by the steps that rim the lower pool of the north waterwall and the stone benches along the center of the space. It should be mentioned that the waterwalls were designed to have minimal water flow (or some years none at all) because of the frequent water shortages in California. Beyond the staircase to the south of the plaza there is another large landscape area of trees and shrubs surrounded by seating.


COMPLETED 1991
LOCATION
San Francisco, California
SITE DESCRIPTION
Granite, water, landscape materials and seating on 14,000 square foot plaza on Market Street
SPONSOR
Art Commission of San Francisco
Tishman Speyer Development Company
CONSULTANTS
Landscape Architect: Cheryl Barton, EDAW;  
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company;
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky

Sanctuary was conceived to provide an inviting gathering place for conversation or private contemplation. It is visible and easily accessible from the cafeteria of the Cancer Research Center.  The design creates a visual dialogue with the architecture. Its location and design are keyed to the unique needs of Sanctuary’s most frequent visitors: hospital residents, doctors and workers; patients and their families.

The structure, 40 feet in diameter, suggests a colonnaded architectural ruin. Three concentric circular levels surround a central pool of water, as if the design has simply exposed a pre-existing natural spring. Each level is rimmed, so that visitors in wheelchairs can safely traverse its pathways. Ambulatory guests can walk up to the water’s edge, which is cantilevered over the pool.

A semicircle of four columns frame one edge, while truncated versions of the same form line the opposite side of the outer ring; these double as individual seats. In front of the taller columns is a freestanding mound of rocks, 6 feet high, from which water flows; its source appears to be hidden within the stones themselves. A single band of naturally formed limestone blocks hugs the opposite inner edge of the circle. The soothing sounds of the waterfall merges with an evocative architectural vocabulary to create a site that provides psychological respite for patients and others.

COMPLETED 1991
LOCATION
H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL
SITE DESCRIPTION
40-foot-diameter concrete plaza set into 1/2 acre landscape
PRIMARY MATERIALS:
Limestone boulders, colored concrete, water, recirculating pool; adjacent landscaping
SPONSOR
University of South Florida, Art in Public Projects Program

Keystone Island is a roughly circular construction of natural cleft and carved Florida fossilized limestone - called Keystone. It is 45 feet in diameter, rising to a height of 12 feet. The site-specific project was commissioned to accompany the new Dade County Courthouse, designed by Arquitectonica. As the building itself is such a strong presence, Zimmerman elected to place her work away from the courthouse and in the lagoon behind the building. Her work links the architecture to the environment; it is an integral aspect of the overall scheme.

A concrete walkway, cantilevered over the lagoon, leads visitors to the island. This walkway was initially part of the Arquitectonica design and Zimmerman incorporated this axis into her own plan. It now looks as if the island was a pre-existing island in the water and that the pier was built to meet it.

The island is dominated by the irregular profile of the oolitic limestone that forms its crown and divides the circle into discrete sections. This material was selected because it is native to the area. Imbedded in its heavily textured surface are clearly visible and identifiable marine fossils such as clams and corals. In addition, Zimmerman noted that panels of this stone were used frequently as decorative elements in Miami’s buildings of the 1920's.

Cut limestone steps lead down to the water’s edge; they look as if they had been carved into the natural cleft stone, but, in fact, they are placed over a concrete foundation. There is seating at the top and bottom of the island. On the lower level a visitor can face a small “tidal pool” of calm water, backed by a wall of the organic stone formation, or look out toward a mangrove forest - the last remnant of the forest that edged most of Biscayne Bay.

The project, dominated by the irregular organic form of the limestone mound, looks as if it always belonged to its site, in contrast to the colorful, high-tech, Arquitectonica building, which is faced with polished surfaces of glass and marble. At the same time, however, the circular form of the island echoes the curvaceous design of the architecture. Zimmerman’s design humanizes the imposing courthouse environment and links it to the natural surroundings. 


COMPLETED 1985
LOCATION
Dade County Courthouse, North Miami, FL
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Oolithic limestone, concrete, and tidal water
COMMISSIONED BY
Metropolitan Dade County Art in Public Places
CONSULTANTS
Architects: Arquitectonica

Terrain is a complex project that combines landscape architecture and site-specific sculpture to create a sequence of evocative spaces in the midst of a commercial development near O’Hare Airport, Chicago, IL. The composition includes a central plaza with two gardens on either side of it, one below grade and the other above. The dramatic and varied landscape is visible from the surrounding hotel and office tower complex and easily accessible.

The 22 boulders on the gridded plaza range in height from 2 to 9 feet and are a startling presence. They, as well as other forms in this metaphoric landscape, allude to the creation of the nearby Great Lakes 15,000 years ago during the last Ice Age. The stones are the “erratics,” boulders carried by glacial movement. They surround an irregularly shaped pool and a narrow, wavering “stream”, a cut in the pavement, flows west across the plaza and empties into a pond in the lower garden.

To a visitor descending into this intimate space, the waterfall creates a gentle sound. In contrast to the pale granite plaza above, the garden has a dark gravel floor. Plantings along the pool edge, daylilies, irises, and thyme, soften the site and introduce natural color. The western edge of this garden is bordered by an 8 foot high crescent-shape berm planted with native wildflowers. The tall berm blocks one’s view of the adjacent airport an forms an acoustic barrier. Informal groups of boulders provide seating.

At the eastern end of the central plaza a 4-foot rise across a protruding granite ledge leads to a very different environment: an undulating space of gentle mounds punctuated by two small pools and crossed by gravel paths. This large area is planted with multiple ground covers, medium-height perennials, and a large grove of silver maples. This lush and shaded garden creates the possibility for private experience.

Using her skills as well as her knowledge of geology and Japanese gardens, Zimmerman has created a site that suggests the history of geological creation amidst the realities of a contemporary locale.


COMPLETED 1987
LOCATION
O’Hare International Center, Chicago, IL
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite boulders, pavers, and ledge; limestone, concrete, gravel, river stones, water, and plant materials
COMMISSIONED BY
Hawthorn Realty Group & Melvin Simon & Associates
CONSULTANTS
Architect: Holabird & Root;
Landscape architect: Freeman Hills & Associates
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring Granite Company;
Site Contractors: Linari Construction; Hayden Landscape

The central element of Marabar is a rectangular reflecting pool, 60 feet long by 6 feet wide, surrounded by five mahogany color granite boulders, each deliberately formed by fracturing the stone along natural cleft lines. Three of these stones have one sheared and highly polished face; these planes mirror one another across the pool. It appears as if these three huge rocks had been one monolithic form, dramatically separated, with the body of water as a consequence of this division. The recessed sides of the pool create the illusion that the water naturally springs from the ground below and is revealed by the cut in the overlying pavement. The rocks do not rest on the surface of the pavement but extend below it; paving was placed around them so that they would appear to be pre-existing elements on that site.

The work has been subtly integrated with the plaza; seven boulders are placed throughout the surrounding landscaped area. A visitor entering the complex sees the large rocks at seemingly random locations. The dispersed elements subliminally prepare the visitor for the focal point of the designs and one’s experience is heightened because of their presence.

The title was determined after the piece was completed. The infinitely reflecting mirror-like surfaces of granite facing each other reminded the artist of the imaginary cave whose interior walls of living rock were mysteriously polished, in E.M. Forster’s novel, A Passage to India.

Marabar is Zimmerman’s first large-scale stone project. It enabled the artist to realize fully her longstanding exploration of the various physical and emotive properties of granite, the polished and the rough, that she had been investigating in smaller works since the early 1970s.

The natural elements seem magical when set in this urban environment; they form a dramatic counterpoint to the contemporary architecture that surround them. The qualities of reflection, both spiritual and physical, that set it apart are reinforced on all levels of the piece. 


COMPLETED 1984
LOCATION
National Geographic Society, Washington, DC
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Granite paving; natural cleft and polished granite boulders; water; adjacent landscaping
COMMISSIONED BY
National Geographic Society, Washington, DC
CONSULTANTS
Architect: Skidmore, Owings and Merrill; Project architect, David Childs
Landscape architect: Urban and Graham;
Fountain engineer: Dr. Gerald Palevsky;
Stone supply & fabrication: Cold Spring  Granite Company

•All texts for the Projects section have been taken from existing catalogues and are by various authors.

This circular composition, 200 feet in diameter, was carved out of a densely forested wood behind a private home; its form responds to the concave silhouette of the rear of the building. The garden includes two pathways, a sunken fountain, and a small seating area. From the back of the house a visitor can traverse the circumference of the piece or wander through the pine grove within its boundary.

From the rear of the house, walking to the right, one is led to an intimate seating area; to the left, a visitor is guided behind a 6-foot-high berm to the sunken fountain in the back of the garden. The randomly paved passage, interrupted by trees, stays level as it cuts behind the berm, but the ground to the right rises. The visitor walks between two, 30-feet-long, sloping walls: a retaining wall for the berm on one side and a freestanding bluestone wall on the other. Each one rises to a height of 6 feet and drops down to 2 feet; where one is at its highest point, the other is at its lowest. While walking, the visitor’s experience constantly shifts; the garden is obscured and gradually revealed when one passes by the walls.

Continuing through this passage, one approaches three additional bluestone walls at the rear of the garden; two of the walls form a “V,” looking at first like a barrier. These planes frame the focal point of the composition, which is visible from the house itself, but is fully revealed to the visitor only at this point: a 45-foot-long pool, 7 feet below grade, fed by a rush of water that springs from ground level. One of the staircases leading to the pool is cantilevered over the moving water. As one descends the stairs on either end, a gentle waterfall over the rough stone walls is exposed. Here the intimate space and the sound of water enclose the visitor, separating him physically and psychologically in a private space away from the surrounding landscape.

This project was Zimmerman’s first permanent outdoor commission. Here she combined her interest in the human perception of space, initially applied to site-specific installations in the 1970s, with her love of Japanese garden design principles. The composition is not one defined by traditional hierarchies; it is revealed by passage through its individual elements.

The title of the piece is derived from the ancient Sanskrit language. The word describes an awareness of emptiness, which necessarily precedes our consciousness of form.


COMPLETED 1982
LOCATION
Private residence, Oak Brook, IL
PRIMARY MATERIALS
Bluestone, concrete, water, and plant materials
CONSULTANTS
Architects: Booth Hansen & Associates
Landscape architect: David Kropp
Masonry: Domestic Marble