Clara Wu Tsai Expands Brooklyn Art Encounters at Barclays Center with Sarah Sze and LaToya Ruby Frazier Commissions

Clara Wu Tsai, co-owner of Brooklyn Sports & Entertainment, has built Brooklyn Art Encounters into a multi-year initiative bringing contemporary art to Barclays Center. Its inaugural commission was LaToya Ruby Frazier's The Liberty Portraits: A Monument to the 2024 Champions (2024–25), portraits of the New York Liberty roster after their 2024 WNBA Finals victory, made with Gladstone Gallery. This fall, Sarah Sze's Wave will hang above the arena's main entrance. Wu Tsai began collecting in 2017, starting with an Agnes Martin and a Felix Gonzalez-Torres light string, then gravitating to Rashid Johnson, Sarah Sze, and Derek Fordjour. She met Frazier at a Gordon Parks Foundation gala, bonding over basketball and support for women athletes. Paul Pfeiffer will hold a residency extending beyond Barclays through workshops with Shaun Leonardo for Brooklyn artists, educators, and young people on broadcast media; Kambui Olujimi's Skelly sculpture will feature bronze figures playing the game. Wu Tsai frames the program as reaching audiences of more than 17,000 who arrive without intending to see art, commissioning work rigorous enough for the art world yet accessible to the public. The Liberty won the 2026 Commissioner's Cup, defeating the Las Vegas Aces 93–85, their second such title.