When the coronavirus started spreading around the world, sculptor Nancy Schön said she knew immediately that she had to document what she was seeing and hearing in her art.
“I had to do it. I had to say what I felt about what is going on in this terrible, terrible time when we’re not paying attention to what we should be,” Schön said of her new sculpture, aptly titled “COVID-19.”
Schön is best known as the artist behind the iconic “Make Way For Ducklings” sculpture in Boston’s Public Garden, in addition to more than a dozen other public art installations across Massachusetts and beyond.
She unveiled her new sculpture on WGBH News’ Greater Boston Tuesday, along with a video describing the “anger, horror and sadness” that led her to create this piece.
In that video, she says she saw the Trump administration “in total denial and ignorance of the situation,” while the medical community took immediate action “to try to avert the hideous tragedy that has now become an unfortunate reality.”
“This country, to date, has lost well over 110,000 innocent souls, for no reason, but total incompetence, stupidity, arrogance, and ego-mania,” she continues in the video.
Schön told Greater Boston host Jim Braude that she has been moved to address political issues in her art, since President Trump took office.
“As I saw what was going on with our president and our administration, I have been moved over the last three and a half years to do a lot of political work,” she explained. “I’m an artist; that’s what I do.”
To watch Schön’s full video about the sculpture, click here: http://schon.com/covid/.
