Tide and Current Taxi Rotterdam
Marie Lorenz

Construction, exhibition and rowing the boat in Rotterdam canal and harbour

24.07.2019 – 01.07.2020

1 Fluyt Hoi 4 Tide and Taxi Rotterdam 1 1 Fluyt Hoi 4 Tide and Taxi Rotterdam 1
Installation view of De Fluyt en de Hoi: Afspraak (by Eléonore Pano-Zavaroni), No Public Realm (by Julian Lewis, Paul Elliman), The Tide and Current Taxi Rotterdam (by Marie Lorenz).

The Tide and Current Taxi is a rowboat taxi operated by the artist Marie Lorenz. Each trip coincides with strong tidal currents and is documented online. The Tide and Current Taxi has operated since 2005, using small plywood boats designed and handmade by the artist, and provides an unexpected view of the New York harbor. The boat and passengers become part of the landscape, floating with the tide, disconnected from routine to create something new out of something familiar. Understanding how the tide works can unlock secret geographies; the city becomes a shifting network of passages, the interaction of manmade and planetary forces.

In July 2019, Marie Lorenz built a new boat in Rib, where it will be displayed until the end of 2019 as part of De Fluyt en de Hoi. In 2020 she will return to navigate the tides through the port and canals. The project’s representation online will draw parallels between ancient tidal networks and new digital pathways. It will bring the mystery of exploration into physical space, to engage participants whether they are seeing the boat in the gallery or following the web-log at their computer.

Stills from the documentary transporting the boat from Jasper Niens’ and Thijs Ewalt’s Studio Pompstraat in Charlois to Rib.
Artist talk by Marie Lorenz, 24 July 2019.

Marie Lorenz (1973, US) lives and works in New York. Lorenz roots her work in exploration and narrative. In her ongoing project The Tide and Current Taxi, Lorenz takes participants through New York waterways in boats that she designs and builds, using tidal current to propel the boat. Recent solo exhibitions include Marie Lorenz: Ezekiaat Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York; Flow Pool at Recess Activities, New York; The Valley of Dry Bones at Jack Hanley Gallery, New York; Wanderlust at High Line Art; and Erie Canal at the Everson Museum of Art, Syracuse, New York—an exhibition about her month-long journey down the Erie Canal. Group shows include Providence at Musee International des Arts Modestes, Sete, France; Future Nature at Jack Hanley Gallery, New York; Public Works: Artists’ Interventions 1970s—Now at Mills College Art Museum, Oakland, CA; Arcadia: Thoughts on the Contemporary Pastoral curated by Steve Locke at Mills Gallery at the Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA. Residencies include International Artist-In-Residence at Artpace, San Antonio, Texas, and John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, Wisconsin. In 2008 she was awarded the Joseph H. Hazen Rome Prize for the American Academy in Rome. Lorenz received a BFA from Rhode Island School of Design and an MFA from Yale and is represented by Jack Hanley Gallery in New York.