frank stella purity precision impersonality abstraction
TRANSCRIPT
Frank Stella
PurityPrecisionImpersonalityAbstraction
Elimination of composition, theme, and other elements of traditional work.
The medium and materials of the work are its reality
The materials were not intended to symbolize anything else.
Color was not used to express feeling or mood, but it simply to delineate space.
Viewer’s response only in terms of the relationship between the various elements of the work.
Viewer’s personal reaction to the object was of higher importance than the artist’s emotions
Art should not reflect the personal expression of its creator
Eliminate the presence of the creator in their work
the Black Paintings (1958–60)
Harran II, 1967. Polymer and fluorescent polymer paint on canvas, 120 x 240 inches.
Protractor Series
Carl Andre
144 Pieces of Zinc, 1967, 144 zinc plates
Fall, 1968. Hot-rolled steel, 21 units, 71 x 28 x 72” each
“sculpture as place rather than form”
Viewer-interactive sculpture
industrial materials
Modular units
Untitled, 1961-9, Woodcut on paper
Untitled, 1973, stainless steel, relief
Donald Judd
Untitled 1969/1982 Anodized aluminum
‘the simple expression of complex thought’
‘stacks’, ‘boxes’ and ‘progressions’
exploration of volume, interval, space and color
Creator out of the work (external manufacturers)
Untitled, 1967-68. Stainless steel and plexiglass, in six parts.
Donald Judd
With Carl Andre’s 144 Pieces of Zinc, 1967
I think of painting without subject matter as music without words. It affects our innermost being as space, spaces, air. -- Kenneth Noland
No. One, 1958Acrylic on canvas
Kenneth Noland
Flat areas of intense color, and a singular form within a given structure.
Noland, Untitled, 1978, aquatint, 14 x 15”
Kenneth NOLAND
Oakum , 1970
synthetic polymer paint on canvas
228.3 (h) x 610.0 (w) cm
Praise, 1976. Rubber stamp print, edition 1000. 16 3/8x16 5/16 inches
The Shell, 1963watercolor and ink on paper12 x 12 in.
Agnes Martin
Agnes Martin, Drift of Summer, 1965, acrylic and graphite on canvas, 72 x 72 in.
"In conceptual art, the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work. When an artist uses a conceptual form of art, it means that all planning and decisions are made beforehand. The execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea becomes the machine that makes the art."
Sol Lewitt
Conceptual art
Critics say of his work that it is: austere, simple, stark, unemotional, serial, minimal, conceptual, architectural, modular, systematic, ...stunningly beautiful.
Question: Who is the artist when someone comes up with an idea for a work of art but has others make or construct it? Must an artist create a work with his/her own hand to produce a valid work of art?
http://www.artnet.com/Galleries/Artists_detail.asp?gid=264&aid=10484
Series 1-2-3: 47 3-Part Variations on Three Different Kinds of Cubes, 1968
three-dimensional structures placing geometric forms—solid or segmented squares and cubes—next to one another using a fixed ratio for the relationship of segments and spaces in each structure.
Serial Project, I (ABCD). 1966Baked enamel on steel units over baked enamel on aluminum, 20" x 13' 7" x 13' 7"
“Like the Minimalists, he often uses simple basic forms, in the belief that ‘using complex basic forms only disrupts the unity of the whole’; like the Conceptualists, he starts with an idea rather than a form, initiating a process that obeys certain rules, and that determines the form by playing itself out. “
MoMA Highlights
Four-Sided Pyramid, 1999, first installation 1997concrete blocks and mortar
Installation of Wall Drawing No. 681 C, National Gallery of Art, Washington, August 25, 1993
Wall Drawing #918 Irregular vertical bands and horizontal bands, 13 x 29', latex paint, 1999, 1999
Splotch #15, 2005
Acrylic on fiberglass; 12’ x 8’ x 6’curvilinear shapes highly saturated colors
Portrait of the Artist Throwing Molten Lead
Torqued Ellipses, 1996, steel 13' h. x 29' L x 20' w (each)
Richard Serra
Large scale minimalist sculpture
(site-specific)