Horses Wearing Nick Cave’s Soundsuits Stampede Into Grand Central Station

Pa, the hors­es got out of the barn again, and dan­ged if they don’t appear to have passed through the Muse­um of Nat­ur­al His­to­ry on their way to Grand Cen­tral.

The oth­er­world­ly beasts are occu­py­ing the famed New York City tran­sit hub’s Van­der­bilt Hall this week as Heard NYC, a col­lab­o­ra­tion between artist Nick Cave and Cre­ative Time, which com­mis­sions work for pre­sen­ta­tion in pub­lic spaces. For his lat­est feat, Cave took his Sound­suits—wear­able sculp­tures with an organ­ic son­ic component—in a direc­tion both equine and ethno­graph­ic. Six­ty dancers from the Ailey School bring the herd of thir­ty to life, stamp­ing raf­fia-sheathed legs and toss­ing black heads aug­ment­ed with fes­tive Rajasthani embroi­dery. Their twice dai­ly per­for­mances occur dur­ing off-peak hours. Chance inter­ac­tions with mid­day trav­el­ers are one thing, but an unscript­ed encounter with an exhaust­ed com­muter rush­ing for the Metro North bar car? That’s a horse of a dif­fer­ent col­or, my friend.

They’ve a far bet­ter like­li­hood of cross­ing paths with your aver­age, unsus­pect­ing Joe than actress Til­da Swin­ton, a‑slumber in her glass cof­fin at the near­by Muse­um of Mod­ern Art (see below), but as of yet, the mon­sters are not viewed as con­sti­tut­ing a major secu­ri­ty threat.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

Wear­able Sculp­ture by Nick Cave (But No, Not That Nick Cave) Invade Microsoft

The Cre­ators Project Presents the Future of Art and Design, Brought to You by Intel and Vice Mag­a­zine

Pi in the Sky: The World’s Largest Ephemer­al Art Instal­la­tion over Beau­ti­ful San Fran­cis­co

Ayun Hal­l­i­day, hav­ing com­muned with the hors­es, is off to cel­e­brate her birth­day at Spa Cas­tle. @AyunHalliday