Perhaps the best known individual works dominating the plaza are the large Reclin ing Figure by Henry Moore in the reflecting pool; the Calder stabile, called Le Guichet (The Ticket Office); Marc Chagall’s Sources of Music and The Triumph of Music in the lobby of the Metropolitan Opera

Zig IV by David Smith, in the lobby of Avery Fisher Hall. (Photo by Jerry L. Thompson)

House; and Richard Lippold’s large suspended sculpture Orpheus and Apollo on the Grand Promenade at Avery Fisher Hall.

Historically, the planning of Lincoln Center included painting and sculpture as an essential part of the environment. A small committee met in 1960, and the first commissioned work was Lippold’s piece, finished in De cem ber of 1962. This was followed by a number of small bronzes by Bour delle, Mes tro vic, and Ro din. Others came in rapid succession during the ’60s, but not without de bates. It seems that, where there is public art, con troversy ensues. The Hen ry Moore and the Calder were no exceptions. Con sidered avant-garde and audacious (even a "horror") by Newbold Morris, the then-commissioner of parks, the Art Commission overruled him by the narrow margin of five to four, and in 1965 both pieces were finally installed.

When I take students out to examine the Moore, asking them what they see, their answers range from elephants to large bones, from cliffs and rocks to dancers and monsters; all are correct. Moore himself said

Chagall's Sources of Music (left) and Triumph of Music beautify the Metropolitan Opera House. (Photo by Winnie Klotz, Metropolitan Opera)

it was "a mixture of two things… in this ‘Reclining Figure’ and the others of mine you find not only a human outline, but also references to landscape or rocks." The setting in the reflecting pool is perfect, since the ripples in the water echo the texture and patina of the bronze surface. As you move around it, the sculpture keeps changing form; from some points of view, one part is larger than the other, then the relationship shifts. The pigeons seem to regard it as theirs, no matter the season. Sunshine, snow, rain, light at night, all have their effects on this humanizing element of the plaza.

Calder’s guichet beckons us to walk under and around it, enjoying its playfulness, and the wonderful way the artist frames different views through it. Again, its abstract quality enables us to envision a gigantic spider, an architectural structure, a plant, dancers.

Lippold’s Orpheus and Apollo upset some critics, who felt the 190 golden metal ribbons threatened like swords hanging over their heads. I have, on the contrary, always regarded them as scintillating music, enlivening the great space in which they are placed

Left: K. 458, The Hunt, by Dimitri Hadzi. Right: Archangel by Seymour Lipton. Both sculptures are in Avery Fisher Hall. (Photos by Jerry L. Thompson)

(Ligeti and Messiaen come to mind). The title, of course, refers to the god Apollo giving the gift of music to his son, Orpheus. It is fascinating to note that John Cage had small Lippold wire sculptures in his Lower East Side loft, and that he based his 14th and 15th Sonatas on a specific Lippold sculpture (the near-invisibility of the sculpture inspiring the near-inaudibility of the music).

Seymour Lipton’s 1964 Archangel has changed places a few times, but always stood on the ground floor inside Avery Fisher. It looks a bit like a huge French horn, crossed with cymbals and biomorphic forms. Lipton considered it a "hallelujah" to Lincoln Center, an affirmation of music and life. Near Archangel, two other sculptures-K. 458 The Hunt (a playful bronze inspired by Mozart’s string quartet) by Dimitri Hadzi and David Smith’s Zig IV-assert their presence. David Smith (1906-1965), one of America’s greatest sculptors, in his Ziggurat series showed his fascination with the contrast between geometric, industrial-type forms and painted steel surfaces.

Le Guichet (The Box Office) by Alexander Calder. (Photo by Jerry L. Thompson)

A large, stainless steel kinetic sculpture, Three X Three Interplay, 1971, by the Israel-born artist Yaacov Agam, dominates the top of the stairs over Alice Tully, leading to Juilliard. Few know that a crank can move these zig-zagging steel tubes into dozens of positions. The artist wanted the work to "perform," since it partook of space near a performing arts school.

Although this is by no means a complete list, I will conclude with sculpture by two major women artists: Louise Nevelson’s huge, black-painted wood Nightsphere-Light, 1969, in the Juilliard Theater lobby, and Lee Bontecou’s Untitled Relief, a mixed-media piece dating from 1964, inside the New York State Theater. Nevelson’s piece does not specifically refer to music, but complements it with its non-objective shapes arranged in rhythmic repetition. The Bontecou, equally abstract, conveys a very different menacing quality.

Don’t miss the dozens of individual sculptures and paintings in each of the halls; the portraits of opera singers downstairs at the Metropolitan Opera House are also well worth looking at.

The Reclining Figure by Henry Moore rests in the reflecting pool outside the Vivian Beaumont and Mitzi E. Newhouse Theaters and within view of The Juilliard School. (Photo by Jerry L. Thompson)

"The Kurt Weill Centennial Exhibition"-consisting of manuscripts, photographs, set designs, and other works on view through May 4 in the Onslager Gallery at the front of the Performing Arts Library-is an absolute tour-de-force. The Vincent Astor Gallery on the lower level of the library has an exhibition through May 25 that includes 35 paintings and drawings of Nureyev by Jamie Wyeth, as well as 61 photographs, designs, and costumes. Gallery hours for both are: Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays from noon to 6 p.m.; Mondays and Thursdays from noon to 8 p.m. Call (212) 870-1630 for information.

Greta Berman is an art historian on the liberal arts faculty.