SpatialStudies 7c: Lecture 5 A Culture of Materials

Transcription

1 SpatialStudies 7c: Lecture 5 A Culture of Materials A. Expansion of Gabo s culture of materials, Smith s new sculpture : B. Examples of works + role of Abstract Expressionism C. Reactions to Abstract Expressionism: Pop and Minimalism (Richard Serra video, Art 21, PBS) D. Images Project III 1. Reader correction: no excerpts from The Writings of Robert Smithson, by Nancy Holt 2. page 139 of reader: finish with is literally being squeezed out of the sculptural object. 3. Page 137, copier cut off bottom line of text: on the left, add sides of the third. Thus no matter how clearly we might, and on the right, that experience.

2 Big picture 7C first half regarding the sources of Modernism in spatial/sculptural realm How the avante-garde approached a new way of working with materials and space Why previously held ideals of art gave way to the real 7C second half History: Post WWII regrouping World of possibilities expands into almost anything and everything that is affected by spatial considerations: Sound, video projection, installation, site-specificity, civic engagement, performance, with the continuation of sculptural objects (including second half of Hal Foster s observation of the return of the real toward the social and site-specific (90s)) The Creative Act: How do we think spatially? How does creative insight happen? What is the role of making objects in today s world?

3 Big picture 7C Projects Project 3 Culture of Materials physical properties, installation Project 4 Chance or Prosthetics you can choose 7C Exercises Beginning 3d modeling Google sketch-up (download for free, tutorials online) 1. Draw your house or apartment using accurate measurements, save as pdf, send to TA. 2. Alter your drawing to a more ideal shape, save as pdf, send to TA. (this is part of your participation grade)

4 A. Expansion of Gabo s culture of materials, Smith s new sculpture A Culture of Materials: Materials and Forms: Our attachment to materials is grounded in our organic similarity to them Materials and Mankind are both derivatives of Matter Our century has been enriched by the invention of many new materials There is no aesthetical prohibition against a sculptor using any kind of material for the purpose of his plastic theme depending on how much his work accords with the properties of the chosen one. (Naum Gabo, Neo-Plasticism and Constructivism) Cindy Sherman, Donald Judd Matter : Value - abject to elevated Source - raw to prefab (found)

5 A. Post WWII, rethinking art new cultural conditions Sculptural Renaissance in America The New Sculpture Clement Greenberg, Art Critic, 1947 David Smith , USA factory worker, uses spare/found parts, produces 26 sculptures in 30 days, Spoleto, Italy, 1962 Championed for his drawing in space, planar presentation, massive energy, emotional and technical risk-taking - restless - open - unresolved forms Hudson River Landscape, 1951

6 B. Examples: Critics spar across Atlantic Greenberg openly criticizes Moore s art as belonging to the Graeco- Roman-Renaissance tradition, 1946, N.Y. MOMA Herbert Read, English critic, sculpture is art of palpation - an art that gives satisfaction in the touching and handling of objects.

7 B. Examples Clement Greenberg suggests that the new sculpture draws its strength not from earlier sculpture but from painting, specifically, cubist collage. Greenberg later elaborates on his theory of the pictorial and begins to use the word optical to describe a sculpture that appealed through the eye to the intellect, rather than to the touch. David Smith, ink drawing above, Rt., Song for an Irish Blacksmith,

8 David Smith, Untitled Drawing, The Letter, 1950s B. Examples sculpture as drawing of ancient texts interest in the kanji ideograms of China

9 B. Examples Welding as new technique (not casting or forging) Making things from parts parallels work experience Fearless variety of expression - an artist supremely aware of motion and stasis Sculpture as action painting the gestural expressionism of these works has been transmuted into straight lines and cylindrical shapes of steel, though the expression of movement, energy, and force is even more complex and centrifugal than in the earlier work. It springs from the flatness of drawings to the three dimensions of the sculpture, as birds might spring en masse from the ground. Gagosian Gallery David Smith, Construction December II, 1964

10 B. Examples, role of Abstract Expressionism Jackson Pollock Action Painting, 1950s

11 Compare suggested motion in: David Smith s Construction December, 1964, & Umberto Boccioni s, Unique Forms of Continuity in Space, 1913

12 Isamu Noguchi US/Europe/ Japan ) Isamu Noguchi, left, sand sculpture - Model to be Seen from Mars, 1947 unrealized, B. Examples Noguchi admired Brancusi s work pessimistic about the atomic age - proposal of an earthwork face, large enough to be recognized from space, informing others that intelligent life form had once existed on our planet

13 B. Examples Louise Nevelson female sculptor working in the mid-century s western art world male dominated, mostly euro extraction collects detritus in NY as old brownstones are demolished language of architecture, collage, montage Night Zag III, above, 1971, Big, right,

14 taken on by Henry Moore as an assistant exposure to D. Smith, and circle of artists gathered around C. Greenberg, opened him up to a whole new set of possibilities returned to London and began welding found metal scrap - less like Moore Anthony Caro, British, 1924-) Aroma, 1966, steel, polished and lacquered blue; 38 x 116 x 58 inches B. Examples Used standard building components: mesh, 3 pipes and steel beam - startlingly simple, unadorned, spare

15 Anthony Caro, Emma Dip, 1974 B. Examples renowned for initially eschewing the pedestal and introducing multiple connections to the ground

16 B. Examples Anthony Caro, Early One Morning, 1962 I-beam welded construction - foreshortening, flattening of form shift from pictorial to architectural

17 B. Examples Anthony Caro, Cadence, I-beam welded construction - pre-formed metal components are emphatic, giving weight and measure to the piece, but the color etherealizes the form. Color doesn t just give sumptuous lightness to the piece: it democratizes the components, forcing attention to the relations of parts to the whole. David Cohen, New York Sun radically open form, frustrates sculptural empathy - not expressive, rusty, and hand-formed

18 Anthony Caro, Sculpture III, 1961

19 HAROLD ROSENBURG - MEANING ATTACHED TO ABSTRACT EXPRESSIONISM THE TRANSCRIPTION OF THE ARTIST S INNER EMOTIONS BY MEANS OF A PICTORIAL OR SCULPTURAL ACT. Anthony Caro, Sculpture III, 1961

20 Mark Di Suvero, 1960s, 70s, USA, timber beams, pre-fab hardware

21 Mark Di Suvero, I-beam constructed outdoor sculpture B. Examples Minimalist Donald Judd criticizes work as Abstract Expressionist, using beams as brushstrokes

22 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: Pop & Minimalism POP - popular mass culture, comic books, advertising, detritus Andy Warhol, Jasper Johns, late 1950s - 60s Jasper John s ale cans there need be no connection between a final art object and the psychological matrix from which it issued

23 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: Pop & Minimalism POP - popular mass culture, comic books, advertising, detritus George Segal, Ed Kienholz, late 1950s - 60s Explicit, narrative, dioramas of every day existence Surreal gestures

24 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: Pop & Minimalism POP - popular mass culture, comic books, advertising, detritus Collage, montage, environments Robert Rauschenberg s combines, Monogram, 1959 bridge gap between AE and Pop

25 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: Pop & Minimalism POP - Claes Oldenburg makes paper mache and soft oversized copies of ordinary objects Two Girl s Dresses,1961 Ghost Toilet, 1966

26 C. POP - R. Artschwager fuses minimalist architectonics with pop iconography Claes Oldenburg, Drum Set, 1967 Richard

27 C. POP - R. Artschwager fuses minimalist architectonics with pop iconography Richard Artschwager, Mirror Mirror, Table Table, 1964

28 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: MINIMALISM - attempt to present art NOT as self-expression, in complete opposition to AE geometric forms, equality of parts, repetition, neutral surfaces, industrial materials, purged of all metaphor Donald Judd, Untitled, 1966

29 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: MINIMALISM - looks like early modernists? closest to Gabo model of autonomy - doesn t have early modernist reformist/revolutionary drive Not about transcendent time and space Refuting the uniqueness, privacy and inaccessibility of experience, of the self Donald Judd, Untitled, 1968

30 C. Donald Judd quality of repetition The order is not rationalistic and underlying, but is simply order, like that of continuity, one thing after another. DJ Avoids inferences of relational composition Repudiates an art (AE) that bases its meanings on illusionism as a metaphor for that privileged (because private) psychological moment. RK EXTERNALITY

31 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: MINIMALISM: Carl Andre RK re: found objects, pg. 135: What they, (minimalists), were doing was exploiting the idea of the readymade in a far less anecdotal way than the pop artists, considering its structural rather than its thematic implications. (inert matter)

32 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: MINIMALISM Richard Serra, Tilted Arcs, Bilbao, Spain. Aim is to defeat the very idea of idealism or timelessness and to make the sculpture visibly dependent on each passing moment for its very existence

33 C. Richard Serra, Charlie Brown, 1999, One Ton Prop, 1969

34 Richard Serra, Hand Catching Lead, film, 69, Casting, 69 C. Early work finding limits, of the body - repetition, and of space - lead casting of corner

35 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: MINIMALISM Robert Morris, Untitled, 1970, c. 1969, 1963

36 Dan Flavin, Monument for Vladimir Tatlin, 1964 Robert Morris, Ring With Light, 1965

37 C. Robert Morris, Nine Fiberglass Sleeves, 67 Eva Hesse, Repetition Nineteen III, 68

38 C. Reactions to abstract expressionism: MINIMALISM Eva Hesse, Accession I, 1967 (left) Contingent, 1969

39 Hans Haacke, Condensation Cube, 1963, Blue Sail, 1964 Haacke begins within a minimalist aesthetic, interested in systems, becomes Conceptualist (to be revisited later in the course )

40 Post minimalism Tony Cragg, above, Stack, 1975, right, Spectrum, 1983 (made earlier works like these) Stacking, propping, leaning, arranging Using existing properties Truth to materials The thingness of the thing (Heidegger)

41 Yayoi Kusama, above, Self Obliteration by Dots, 1968, below left, Endless Love Room, Below right, Adrian Piper, Catalysis VI, 1970 So far much discussion dominated by male artists Moving into immersive environments and performance works developing at the same time

42 Project III A Culture of Materials You are elevating the ordinary into a work of art You are utilizing properties already evident in the material "...the shaping of any section of the work would respond to the real, structural requirements placed on that section. If sheet metal gains greater compressive strength when it is folded or rolled, then this fact accounts for curved elements within the work" - Rosalind Krauss

43 Vladimir Tatlin Counter Relief Culture of Materials

44 Investigate the structural properties and potential of materials as they relate to making objects and their occupation of space. Utilizing a Constructivist approach, such as Vladimir Tatlin's, "Corner Relief" and its externalization of the structure and logic of sculpture: generate a form or configuration that embodies one of the following qualities from the kit of materials you are given: Suspension Tension Expansion Contraction Levitation Balance/Imbalance Fragility Cantilever Artists to consider: Tatlin, Fischli and Weiss, Martin Kersels, Tom Friedman, Sarah Sze, Jessica Stockholder, Tara Donovan, Robert Morris, Tony Cragg, Yayoi Kusama

45 Sarah Sze, b. 1969

46 Sarah Sze, 2013 Venice Biennale Triple Point

47 Sarah Sze, 2013 Venice Biennale Triple Point

48 Sarah Sze, 2013 Venice Biennale Triple Point

49 Sarah Sze, 2013 Venice Biennale Triple Point

50 Martin Kersels, rt., prosthetic, rubber bands, motor Tom Friedman, below, In Memory of a Piece of Paper

51 Tom Friedman Untitled (erasure crumbs, toothpicks)

52 Tom Friedman chair soap

53 Tom Friedman (construction paper, self-portrait fragmentation from motorcycle crash)

54 Jessica Stockholder

55 Jessica Stockholder

56 Tara Donovan styrofoam cups

57 Tara Donovan paper plates

58 Tara Donovan

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