Saturday, January 20, 2007

'Spatial, not sculptural'

I've been thinking a lot about this idea of the house as a sculpture. I think I know what you mean when you say 'spatial, not sculptural', but I'm finding it hard to move on from there, as I maybe see spatial experience (emotion) and geometry (science) as inherently linked.

I had a good look at the Donald Judd at the NGA when Amy and I were up in Canberra after christmas. That's the same piece above, but it was placed differently, sitting on terracotta tiles at 60 degrees to the room - to line up with the triangular grid in the ceiling I think. And lit more sharply which created more reflections around it on the floor.

The thing I like about it, and why I think it could be relevant and useful for this project is for proximity. You are always explicitly aware of the position of your own body in relation to the piece, and I think its this that drags you around it, up to it and back from it. Material and formal properties aside, is that the effect you hope this sculpture in the landscape to produce?

Maybe we need to dig out your masters on how work effects how people move in galleries Lily?

Image: Donald Judd, Untitled (six boxes), 1974, collection of the National Gallery of Australia

2 comments:

rory said...

We've got a day set aside to do the day trip from New York upstate to Dia:Beacon. Along with their permanent collection of Flavins, Judds, Serras, LeWitts, Smithsons and Richters, theres also a big Agnes Martin show. I will be thinking about space.

rory said...

Thanks for the tip ateava. If you can handle Serrota's pompous intellectual phrasing, there are some good observations on there.

"[Judd was] very conscious that facing a sculpture in a space conditioned the way you looked at it; conditioned the way you felt about it; it conditioned literally the way your own body responded to it."

And did you know when he got out of the army, Judd wasn't sure whether he wanted to be an architect or an artist...