bettina pousttchi turns guardrails into sculpture at rockefeller center

steel guardrails become urban art at rockefeller center

Bettina Pousttchi transforms a familiar element of urban infrastructure into a monumental sculptural presence in New York City, opening a dialogue between art, architecture, and the city’s layered history. Installed at Rockefeller Center, Vertical Highways V03 (2025) reimagines highway guardrails as vertical, rhythmic forms that echo circulation while suspending their original function. ‘By installing my sculpture Vertical Highways V03 in front of Rockefeller Center, I want to initiate a dialogue of art and architecture that resonates with the urban history of New York City,’ the artist notes.

On view until April 17th, 2026, the work occupies the Channel Gardens, the historic axis connecting Fifth Avenue to The Rink. Constructed from reconfigured guardrails, the sculpture continues the artist’s long-standing engagement with elements that organize and regulate movement. Barriers, bollards, and roadside components are bent, pressed, and recolored, then recomposed into vertical arrangements where repetition and variation take precedence over function. In Vertical Highways V03, these fragments no longer direct traffic or define boundaries but operate as formal units, suggesting movement without controlling it.

This transformation reflects Pousttchi’s ongoing investigation into how infrastructure shapes perception. By isolating and serializing these objects, she draws on the legacy of Minimal Art while recalling the conceptual shift introduced by Marcel Duchamp’s readymades , repositioning everyday urban elements within the realm of public art.

all images by Guillaume Ziccarelli

bettina pousttchi’s transnational series lands in New York

The presentation at Rockefeller Center follows earlier iterations of the Vertical Highways series installed in major public contexts, including the Jardin des Tuileries in Paris, a permanent work in front of Berlin Central Station, and a site near the Istanbul Modern Museum. The New York installation extends this trajectory, placing one of the artist’s largest sculptures within a dense commercial and cultural setting.

Bettina Pousttchi’s work also enters into dialogue with Rockefeller Center’s nearly century-long commitment to public art, originally established by John D. Rockefeller, Jr., and Abigail Rockefeller. Today, the campus hosts more than 100 permanent artworks alongside a rotating program of temporary installations, positioning contemporary commissions within an established architectural and cultural framework.

‘Bettina Pousttchi’s Vertical Highways V03 transforms the language of infrastructure into a striking visual experience. Public art has long been central to Rockefeller Center’s identity, and this installation continues that tradition in a way that feels both contemporary and deeply connected to our architectural heritage. We’re proud to share this work with everyone who visits Rockefeller Center,’ shares EB Kelly, Head of Rockefeller Center and Senior Managing Director, Tishman Speyer.

Over the past fifteen years, the German artist has developed a practice centered on large-scale, site-specific works that respond to their architectural and social surroundings. Rather than inserting autonomous objects into public space, her installations tend to echo the logics already embedded in their environments, from circulation systems to facade rhythms.

Bettina Pousttchi brings her ongoing Vertical Highways series to the US for the first time