THE United Nations’ headquarters is a hub of global diplomacy, but its 39 floors are home to more than just negotiations — the grounds and buildings also host some 400 gifts from member states. A stroll around the complex on the east side of Midtown Manhattan will take you past these sculptures, tapestries and paintings. Some tell stories of key moments in history, like a tapestry donated by Belarus documenting the nuclear disaster at the Chernobyl power plant in Ukraine, or a stone tablet that was once Genghis Khan’s diplomatic passport.
One of the most famous is “Non-Violence,” a bronze 45-calibre revolver with its barrel tied in a knot. A gift from Luxembourg, the artist was inspired to create it by the murder of John Lennon — the Beatles member shot near Central Park, not far from the UN, in 1980. Some of the first gifts, according to Werner Schmidt, who works in the UN management department and became an expert in the UN’s art collection when he oversaw a huge, six-year renovation of the 18-acre campus, are two murals painted on the walls of the General Assembly hall, the meeting place of the 193member body.
French artist Fernand Leger wasn’t able to come to the US, so he designed the murals and sent his student with a preliminary sketch to paint them for him. US President Harry Truman gave one of the two untitled, abstract works a nickname that has stuck — scrambled eggs. These days, accepting anonymous gifts is a no-no — and only member countries can donate artwork, Schmidt says. There are also limits to what is accepted, as there isn’t enough space to house limitless artworks, according to Schmidt. “We’re not built to be a museum.”
There is also some tactful diplomacy required — gifts can’t be too political, and the UN’s designated arts committee must take into consideration whether all 193 members states would be happy to have them in the headquarters of an organisation that all of them fund. Portraits are rarely seen for this reason, says Schmidt, as it’s unusual to find a figure that everyone agrees is worthy of being immortalised in the halls of the UN. Iran donated eight portraits of secretaries general, woven from silk, that hang in the main entrance to the complex — a portrait of current UN chief Antonio Guterres should be coming soon, Schmidt says. Two US politicians are the only non-UN chiefs who made the cut: US president Woodrow Wilson, and Herbert Lehman, one of the founders of the Lehman Brothers investment bank. Some pieces are donated by countries that no longer exist.
From the Soviet Union, a bronze statue of a man with a hammer in one hand and a sword in the other, titled “Let us beat swords into ploughshares,” stands in front of the East River, with a view to a New York landmark — the PepsiCola sign in Long Island city on the other side of the water. From what was at the time the nation of East Germany, “Der Aufsteigende (The Rising Man)” was inspired by a poem by Wolf Biermann, the dissident singer-songwriter who was eventually denied re-entry to the German Democratic Republic, as it was then known.
Some of the gifts are where diplomats sit and debate every day — the UN Security Council chamber, with its blue chairs around a circular table that have been the stage for tense debates between Russia, the US, France and other council members, was donated by Norway in 1952. The Nordic countries dominate in interior design here — the nearby Trusteeship Council chamber was donated by Denmark in 1953, and the Economic and Social Council chamber was donated by Sweden in 2016. While some of the pieces are such a part of the furniture that they largely go unnoticed, others are impossible to ignore. The outdoor sculptures have a weight limit and shouldn’t be heavier than a ton, because the UN garden sits on top of the basement part of the building.
Nevertheless, they are large enough to need to be moved in by crane, Schmidt says. Gifts are sometimes recalled and replaced for various reasons, Schmidt says. One of his favourite pieces, a model of Chinese railroads carved entirely out of ivory, was recalled by Beijing. By the time of the massive renovation Schmidt oversaw between 2008 and 2017, the gift “had fallen a little bit out of its time,” as he diplomatically describes it.
International trade in ivory has been banned since 1989. One controversial pachyderm has managed to keep its spot, towards the end of the path curling around the UN garden. It appears to be hiding in the bushes, set back from the path. It’s “The Sleeping Elephant,” a 4.9-ton elephant donated by Kenya in 1998. “It’s a very shy animal,” Schmidt says, by way of explaining why it is set back from the path, unlike the rest of the sculptures.
To create the piece, the artist sedated an elephant and made a cast of it, but there are rumours that the reason the creature is hidden is that it unexpectedly became sexually aroused during the process. “While the elephant was asleep, he must have dreamed something and so when he was presented to the UN, there was a sort of a consensus that the elephant should be on display in a habitat that comes very close to its natural jungle,” Schmidt says. “I wouldn’t say it’s hidden,” he adds. And when prodded about the status of the elephant’s member, he stays diplomatically vague. “I have to tell you that I’m an expert on many things but on that subject, unfortunately, I’m not”. – dpa
