Artist Florencio Gelabert Installs Work in Public Space

Miami is an important venue for public sculptures. The most recent one is Column Tree, by Florencio Gelabert, an artist of Cuban descent who lives in Miami. The work was commissioned by Related Group, an important real-estate developer well known for incorporating art in their projects. Column Tree—made of stainless steel, steel bar, burlap, gauze, aqua-resin, and paint—was installed in a park by the ocean, in complete harmony with the surrounding nature.
Tree Column is a large sculpture consisting of five trunks intersected by mirrors; a vibrant tree that seems eclipsed by technology. For the piece—measuring 27 feet high and 39 inches wide—the artist used a central steel bar assembled with welded structures and stainless-steel plates. The industrial process is key to the work. The tree trunks—made of burlap, gauze, and aqua-resin— and the plates produce an intentionally provoked tension between the industrial and the organic, technology and nature.
"Nature has been a symbol of birth, life, and harmony in my sculptures, and it’s the central motif of this work. I am fascinated by the creation of public sculptures that relate to human beings and their environment, encouraging communication between these and architecture," the artist stated recently on the subject of his sculpture. "In this piece, I explore ideas that allow me to confront personal experiences with reality. Stainless-steel mirrors cut through the trunks, reflecting and multiplying them, and thus exalting their presence in order to combine the organic with the industrial, and to question our position in a world created and controlled by man along with a natural world that we do not control."
The work can be seen at 3101 NE 7th Ave, Miami, Florida 33137.