Uploaded September 2025 | Updated September 2026, 1 week ago
JANET ECHELMAN
Sculptor
Author, Radical Softness: The Responsive Art of Janet Echelman
Joseph G. Astman Presidential Academic Symposium Scholar
Janet Echelman shares her artwork at the scale of buildings and city blocks, where she creates large-scale, fluid installations that merge art, architecture, and engineering. Her work transforms with wind and light, inviting viewers into immersive experiences rather than static observation. Echelman uses unconventional materials—from atomized water particles to fiber stronger than steel—blending traditional craft with advanced computational design. Her monumental works anchor public spaces across five continents, in cities including New York, London, Sydney, Shanghai, and Singapore. Permanent installations in locations such as San Francisco, Vancouver, and Porto continually evolve with shifting light and air. Echelman’s unconventional path includes a degree from Harvard, five years living in a Balinese village, and graduate studies in both painting and psychology.
The major new monograph from Princeton Architectural Press, Radical Softness: The Responsive Art of Janet Echelman (2025), is a comprehensive sourcebook that unpacks Echelman's vital practice and her ongoing commitment to, "Taking Imagination Seriously," the title of her TED Talk which has been translated into thirty-five languages and has more than two million views. It features mesmerizing color photographs, a foreword by fellow creative Swizz Beatz, and contributions from a diverse range of internationally recognized scholars, engineers, designers, architects, and curators contextualizing the interdisciplinary impact of Echelman's work within the fields of global art history, architecture, computation, and landscape architecture. Visit echelman.com
Part of Hofstra University's 2025 Presidential Symposium: The Beauty of...
Learn more at https://www.hofstra.edu/ps25
JANET ECHELMAN
Sculptor
Author, Radical Softness: The Responsive Art of Janet Echelman
Joseph G. Astman Presidential Academic Symposium Scholar
Janet Echelman shares her artwork at the scale of buildings and city blocks, where she creates large-scale, fluid installations that merge art, architecture, and engineering. Her work transforms with wind and light, inviting viewers into immersive experiences rather than static observation. Echelman uses unconventional materials—from atomized water particles to fiber stronger than steel—blending traditional craft with advanced computational design. Her monumental works anchor public spaces across five continents, in cities including New York, London, Sydney, Shanghai, and Singapore. Permanent installations in locations such as San Francisco, Vancouver, and Porto continually evolve with shifting light and air. Echelman’s unconventional path includes a degree from Harvard, five years living in a Balinese village, and graduate studies in both painting and psychology.
The major new monograph from Princeton Architectural Press, Radical Softness: The Responsive Art of Janet Echelman (2025), is a comprehensive sourcebook that unpacks Echelman's vital practice and her ongoing commitment to, "Taking Imagination Seriously," the title of her TED Talk which has been translated into thirty-five languages and has more than two million views. It features mesmerizing color photographs, a foreword by fellow creative Swizz Beatz, and contributions from a diverse range of internationally recognized scholars, engineers, designers, architects, and curators contextualizing the interdisciplinary impact of Echelman's work within the fields of global art history, architecture, computation, and landscape architecture. Visit echelman.com
Part of Hofstra University's 2025 Presidential Symposium: The Beauty of...
Learn more at https://www.hofstra.edu/ps25
