Running at Long Bridge Park on a cloudy fall day (Staff Photo by Jay Westcott)
Arlington Visit for First Lady — First Lady Jill Biden is set to deliver remarks at the 2023 PFLAG National Convention at a hotel in Pentagon City this afternoon, according to guidance from the White House. The LGBTQ+ organization’s event is sold out.
AWLA Asks for Help — “Today we only have two open dog kennels. The rest are full. We are desperately in need of families to give our dogs a break from the kennel and make room for more dogs coming into our care.” [Twitter]
A Muslim group’s planned banquet in Arlington has been cancelled after it says the hotel received “multiple terror threats.”
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) was scheduled to hold its 29th annual banquet Saturday night at the Crystal Gateway Marriott at 1700 Richmond Highway.
The concrete spheres and steel poles of Dark Star Park create more than a striking sculpture. Photo by Elman Studios.
Visitors gather each year to witness the annual Dark Star Park Day alignment. Photo by Elman Studios.
Dark Star Park in Rosslyn, designed by artist Nancy Holt, was created to connect art, time and place. Photo by Elman Studios.
Every year, for just a few minutes, one of Arlington’s most iconic works of public art comes to life exactly as its artist intended.
On Saturday, Aug. 1, at approximately 9:32 a.m., visitors will gather in Rosslyn to witness the annual shadow alignment at Nancy Holt’s Dark Star Park (1979–84). At that precise moment, the shadows cast by the sculpture’s spheres and poles align with permanent shadow forms embedded in the ground—a phenomenon Holt designed to commemorate the anniversary of Rosslyn’s founding.
The alignment lasts only a few moments, but it has become a beloved Arlington tradition, drawing residents, visitors, artists and architecture enthusiasts alike to experience the intersection of art, astronomy, and history. If the weather cooperates, the park transforms into a striking demonstration of how light, time and place can become part of a work of art.
Created between 1979 and 1984, Dark Star Park was Arlington’s first County-commissioned public artwork and remains one of the nation’s earliest examples of integrated public art—where sculpture, landscape architecture and the surrounding environment function as a single work. Rather than placing an object within a park, Holt made the entire park the artwork, incorporating spheres, pools, steel poles, tunnels, earthworks and carefully positioned plantings into an immersive landscape.
Nancy Holt (1938–2014) was a pioneering artist whose work spanned poetry, film, photography, land art and large-scale public sculpture. Throughout her career, she explored perception, time and humanity’s relationship with the natural world. Dark Star Park remains her most significant urban installation and one of the few major works by the artist that can be experienced in an accessible city setting.
Whether you’ve attended for years or have never visited before, Dark Star Park Day offers a rare opportunity to experience a public artwork that changes with the movement of the sun—and reminds us that some of the most memorable moments in art happen not inside a museum, but out in the world around us.
Dark Star Park Day
When: Saturday, Aug. 1, beginning around 9 a.m.; shadow alignment at approximately 9:32 a.m. Where: Dark Star Park, 1655 N. Fort Myer Drive, Rosslyn
Today (Thursday), retired Fairfax County Judge David Schell denied most of the county’s motions to dismiss the case, according to an attorney for the 10 residents who sued Arlington. He had put off making a decision for one month when the parties last convened in court in September.
Here in Arlington, real estate is a spectator sport. Let’s take a look at some of the most and least expensive townhouses sold last month (September 2023).
Crime scene tape at shooting scene in Green Valley (staff photo by Jay Westcott)
Arlington has a slightly higher than average crime rate compared to the region overall, according to a new report.
The Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments recently released its annual report, in which it compiled crime statistics reported out by local police departments, including Arlington County Police Department.
Views of the northern portion of Lacey Woods Park (via Arlington County)
The northern portion of Lacey Woods Park will be getting a facelift.
Arlington County will replace the lighted basketball court and multi-use field at the 14-acre park along N. George Mason Drive near Ballston, according to a project webpage.
Point of sale payment at a store (Photo by Blake Wisz on Unsplash)
Don’t be surprised if your receipt lacks a sales tax charge this weekend.
Starting Friday at 12:01 a.m. and running until midnight on Sunday, a variety of products, from school supplies to refrigerators, will be exempt from taxation during a three-day tax holiday.
Police car at night (file photo courtesy Kevin Wolf)
A 43-year-old Arlington man is in jail after an overnight barricade situation in the Buckingham neighborhood.
The incident started around 12:30 a.m. with what was reported as a woman’s ex-boyfriend kicking down her door and confronting her and her current boyfriend with a knife.