THE RETURN OF THE HOT DOG: Artists Jen Catron & Paul Outlaw Debut a New Iteration of their Iconic Times Square Installation for America 250

(NEW YORK, NY — June 30, 2026) — Times Square Arts is pleased to present Hot Dog: The Second Serving, a restaging of Hot Dog in the City, a monumental public artwork by Brooklyn-based artists Jen Catron and Paul Outlaw. On view from July 21–August 8, 2026 in Times Square’s largest public plaza, Duffy Square, the 65-foot-long sculpture debuts in a reimagined form, offering a renewed portrait of America on the occasion of the nation’s Semiquincentennial.

“The hot dog returns in an altered form to reflect an altered nation. As the United States marks its 250th anniversary, we found ourselves returning to questions that animated the original project: spectacle, patriotism, celebration, and power. Symbols persist. Myths persist. Their meanings shift. Two years after its initial appearance, the sculpture returns to a country that is both familiar and changed, revealing new tensions within a symbol that once seemed self-evident,” said Jen Catron and Paul Outlaw.

Equal parts spectacle, celebration, and critique, the supersized hot dog was first unveiled in 2024 as an iconic symbol of New York City and American culture to examine class, capitalism, and the enduring myths of the American Dream. Complete with an oversized bun, a classic pink frankfurter, and a sweeping ribbon of yellow mustard, the satirical monument was animated by hydraulic lifts, periodically showering visitors with confetti in a nod to quintessential American festivities and hyper-masculine displays of patriotism.

Two years later, the 2026 iteration of the hot dog returns in commemoration of the United States’ 250th anniversary, at a markedly different moment. As with any birthday, there is reason to celebrate, but a semiquincentennial also demands reflection—on where we’ve been, and where we’re headed.

Amid a political and cultural climate increasingly shaped by spectacle and violence, Hot Dog: The Second Serving takes on renewed significance. In addition to many of the work’s original elements—including daily confetti blasts—new  interventions deepen its engagement with patriotism, monumentality, power, and national mythology. Simultaneously humorous and unsettling, the hot dog occupies the unstable territory between celebration and critique, probing the blurred boundaries between leadership and performance, monument and branding, patriotism and pageantry, and the construction of national self-image.

Catron and Outlaw offer a grandiose portrait of America that reckons with a political and cultural climate that is increasingly shaped by spectacle. Stretching across Times Square, the sculpture returns not as a replica of its former self, but as an  altered monument for a changed moment.

“Times Square has always been a place where America puts itself on display for the world, and there's no better stage, and no better moment than the nation's 250th birthday, to ask what we're actually celebrating. Jen Catron and Paul Outlaw hold that spectacle up to the light, with humor, with scale, and with real provocation,” said Anna Starling, Director of Times Square Arts and Vice President, Development & Partnerships at Times Square Alliance.

ABOUT JEN CATRON AND PAUL OUTLAW
Jen Catron & Paul Outlaw are an artist duo whose large-scale sculptures and performances examine spectacle, excess, and the construction of national myth. Working across public and institutional contexts, they transform vernacular symbols into civic-scale monuments that engage broad audiences, using humor and scale to draw viewers into critical encounters with systems of consumption, celebration, and collective belief. Their work foregrounds how power is performed and sustained in shared space.

Their practice moves between extremes of scale—monumental public works that activate civic environments and intimate miniatures that compress grand narratives into precise, uncanny forms. This oscillation invites close looking and wide participation, destabilizing hierarchies between the epic and the everyday while revealing how cultural meaning is constructed, circulated, and contested.

Catron & Outlaw have presented projects with institutions including the Brooklyn Museum, Times Square Arts, the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD), and Creative Time. Their work has received national and international press coverage and is held in collections including the Brooklyn Museum and Beth Rudin DeWoody. They live and work in Brooklyn, New York.

ABOUT TIMES SQUARE ARTS
Times Square Arts, the public art program of the Times Square Alliance, collaborates with contemporary artists and cultural institutions to experiment and engage with one of the world's most iconic urban places. Through the Square's electronic billboards, public plazas, vacant areas and popular venues, and the Alliance's own online landscape, Times Square Arts invites leading contemporary creators, such as Charles Gaines, Joan Jonas, Jeffrey Gibson, Pamela Council, Mel Chin and Kehinde Wiley, to help the public see Times Square in new ways. Times Square has always been a cultural district and place of risk, innovation and creativity, and the arts program ensures these qualities remain central to the district's unique identity.

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