Review
3 X 3: FLAVIN, ANDRE, JUDD
National Gallery of Canada
Runs until April 4
Illingworth Kerr Gallery (ACAD)
Works by three American artists who helped redefine how we think about sculpture are currently on exhibit in the Illingworth Kerr Gallery at the Alberta College of Art and Design.
3 x 3: Flavin, Andre, Judd is a touring exhibition from the National Gallery of Canada of pieces by Don Flavin, Carl Andre and Donald Judd. The collection dates from the late 1960s to mid-1970s, when gallery curator Brydon Smith began to collect works by these influential and innovative sculptors.
These three artists collectively shrugged off the heavy conventions of the art world during the 1960s and took sculpture into another way of being. Using commercially available materials and existing objects to create vital forms, they challenged the very underpinnings of what sculpture was "supposed" to look like. Not only did their pieces bring fresh thinking to a traditional art form, it also asked art lovers, gallery owners and critics to use new eyes to view this exciting art.
Andre, who was born in 1935, is the only one of the trio still living. His Lever, 1966 is a long row of fire bricks placed on the floor to create a form that highlights the muscularity of the material while creating a physical obstacle that must be negotiated by those walking through the gallery. The sculpture confronts the viewer and forces consideration of its formidable presence as it bisects the room. Always conscious of structure, Andre, a former intelligence officer in the U.S. Army and, later, railway conductor on the Pennsylvania Railroad, also began to write concrete poetry, a form that places words on a page to create a drawing. An example of this work is included as part of this exhibition.
Where Andre’s work speaks to physicality, the sculpture of Flavin (1933 - 1996) is about light and colour, and how it can be used to fill the spaces of galleries. Through the use of everyday fluorescent light fixtures, Flavin steadfastly ignored the long traditions of sculpture and created something that, even 40 years after he conceived of it, remains fresh.
In an essay entitled "…in daylight and cool white" that originally appeared in a 1969 exhibition catalogue by Brydon Smith, Flavin explains the allure of the elongated fluorescent bulb: "Regard the light and you are fascinated – practically inhibited from grasping its limits at each end. While the tube itself has an actual length of eight feet, its shadow, cast from the supporting pan, has but illusively dissolving ends. This waning cannot really be measured without resisting consummate visual effects."
Flavin’s Monument 4 Those Who Have Been Killed in Ambush (to PK who reminded me about death) uses red fluorescent bulbs to create a startling work that thrusts out from the wall where it is attached, filling the gallery with a thick red light that is unmistakably linked to bloody death. During a time that saw thousands of U.S. citizens protesting against the Vietnam War, Flavin constructed this work, a lasting monument to those who are killed carrying out the dirty deeds of their political taskmasters. It’s a sculpture that makes as forceful a statement about war as any stone edifice.
Judd (1928 - 1994) is the third sculptor whose works are included in 3 x 3 and another artist whose influence continues to be felt today. A former arts writer and painter, Judd began to create austere sculptures beginning in the early ’60s. His untitled work from 1966 constructed of nine hollow galvanized metal boxes is an impressive monolith that today could stand as a monument to minimalism.
Unfortunately, it seems few people are taking the opportunity to view this exhibition. The day I saw the show, I was the only person at the Illingworth Kerr Gallery (with the exception of two security guards, who nervously kept watch as I scribbled notes). Flavin, Andre and Judd were three minimalist masters who were instrumental in creating nothing short of a new movement in art, and anyone who cares about sculpture and modern art should see this show. |
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