Robert Indiana created a series of constructions (herms) during the late 1950s and early 1960s, using discarded objects he found in his Coenties Slip neighborhood. The artist returned to making constructions in the early 1980s, after he moved to Vinalhaven, Maine. Bay, the first construction he made there, includes elements from all of the places that Indiana lived and worked: a wooden beam from Coenties Slip, iron wheels from the Bowery, and a nautical metal ring from his Vinalhaven sail loft. The title of the sculpture references the local (Vinalhaven is an island in Penobscot Bay) and also reflects the artist’s penchant for short three and four-letter words. The blue arrow at the top points to an inlet shaped depression in the wood.
Bay was the first of Indiana’s Vinalhaven constructions that was cast in bronze, in 1991.