Vassar College Art Library

Noyes Hall at Vassar College by Eero Saarinen, Poughkeepsie, New York

Today in 1885, the Statue of Liberty arrived in New York Harbor — not standing tall, but packed into 214 crates.

Shipped from France aboard the Isère, the statue came in hundreds of pieces and hundreds had to wait on Bedloe’s Island while its pedestal was finished. It was finally assembled and dedicated the following year, in 1886.

On this day in 1885, the Statue of Liberty arrived in New York Harbor from France — not standing tall, but packed in pieces.

Nearly a century later, in 1984–85, photographer Jet Lowe documented Lady Liberty from unusually close angles during a major restoration project ahead of her centennial.

These images show details most visitors never see: the torch, the tablet, the face, and the folds of the statue under scaffolding.

Images: Jet Lowe / Historic American Engineering Record, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.

“I go back and forth between wanting to be abundantly simple and maddeningly complex.” - John Baldessari

Born on this day John Baldessari stands as one of the defining figures of West Coast conceptual art, as well as a deeply influential teacher. Starting in the mid-1960s, he pushed beyond conventional artistic forms, building a body of work over the following five decades that spans painting, photography, prints, film, video, installation, and sculpture, all marked by a distinctive wit and inventiveness. By drawing on found and appropriated imagery, Baldessari raised pointed questions: who or what holds authority and authorship over an image, where the lines between mediums actually fall, how words and pictures relate to one another, and how meaning shifts depending on the context in which an image appears.

Image credit:
John Baldessari, "Two Highrises (With Disruptions) / Two Witnesses (Red and Green)," 1990. Color photographs and vinyl paint. The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. Gift of the artist.

American Utopia: Why Artists Can’t Stop Imagining a Better World T’s annual Art issue explores how the idea of a good if elusive place has inspired great art, and vice versa.