<p>For
 the second “new” piece, two billboard-size photographs of clouds and 
soaring birds stand in a shadowy gallery. The installation’s only other 
component is an audio element: a periodic burst of harsh noise, like a 
roaring wind or an explosion. (In fact, it’s a recording of frenzied 
applause that greeted a 1990 concert by Kathleen Battle and Jessye 
Norman at Carnegie Hall.)</p>
<p>Both
 realizations are pristinely beautiful. But both feel museum-style 
static. (The bird images had greater impact when, mysteriously, they 
showed up on public billboards around the city some years ago.) For me, 
the emphasis on fixity as a measure of authenticity, as implied by the 
Foundation’s “core tenets,” deflects attention from the emotional 
probing that makes Gonzalez-Torres’s art so moving.</p>