Julian Opie at Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition, The Helis Foundation, New Orleans, USA

22 June 2026

The Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition (PCSE), presented by The Helis Foundation, features works by Julian Opie as part of its latest edition. Recognised as the leading rotating public sculpture exhibition in the American South, PCSE occupies the heart of downtown New Orleans, extending along Poydras Street from Convention Center Boulevard to North Galvez Street.

Among the 13 installations currently on view, Opie presents Yellow phone. (2023) and Turquoise hair. (2023) both deriving from Opie’s Busan Walkers series of 2023. Rendered in high-gloss auto paint on aluminum, each depicts a figure in motion – a passerby originally photographed on the Busan seafront and subsequently translated into a drawing, which in turn served as templates for a series of twenty statues. A simplified profile view of a body has been enlarged – given volumetric depth – and yet the image remains studiedly two-dimensional. At once inhabiting the physical world and the virtual space, the figure in Yellow phone. (2023) expresses a quality – pervasive in Opie’s art – of demonstrative gesture and self-containment as he walks while looking at his phone. The young woman of Turquoise hair. (2023) adopts a more extravagant posture, flinging out one arm behind her to merge with her hair.

Find out more via The Helis Foundation.

Image: Julian Opie at The Helis Foundation, Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition, New Orleans © Julian Opie