Courtyard Commission: Precious Okoyomon

Artist and poet Precious Okoyomon (Nigerian-American, b. 1993) transforms the MoMA PS1 courtyard into a living forest of plants, interactive sculpture, and sound in our inaugural Courtyard Commission. Among the Flowers I Learned to Love: A Garden of Decreation is Okoyomon’s largest outdoor installation to date and cultivates a world of grasses, flowers, weeds, sedges, pollinators, and vines. This ever-growing woodland brings together species often perceived in opposition, but which in reality co-exist: native and invasive plants, annuals and perennials, cultivated and wild growth. In the center of the garden, visitors can enter, climb through, and emerge from an oversized teddy bear sculpture. A sound piece brings whimsical instrumentation inspired by flowers into the courtyard, with poetry read by the artist playing inside of the bear. Anticipating the landscapes of the near future, and considering the unpredictability of climate changes, Okoyomon creates a garden for the city, in which softness, rest, and rebirth are essential. The Courtyard Commission is a site-specific, biannual program that invites artists to create new large-scale work, imagining how experimental art can transform outdoor space.