Donald Judd
Exhibition Guide PreviousRoom 3 Next
 
Untitled 1963
 
  Untitled 1963,
Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institute, Joseph H. Hirshhorn Purchase Fund, 1991
Art © Donald Judd Foundation/VAGA, New York and DACS, London 2004
 

In 1963–4, Judd continued to explore the concept of open and closed space. A red floor box is a largely enclosed rectangular volume. However, a semi-circular channel cut into the upper surface is emphasised by an iron pipe inset into the trough. Judd tried to avoid positioning the channel in an obvious spot, commenting that ‘I did a great deal of juggling to make it uncomposed’. Another box, painted a vibrant chartreuse green, with a semi-circular yellow enamelled iron pipe inserted into the trough, demonstrates Judd’s early and unusual commitment to exploring the potential of colour in sculpture.

To Susan Buckwalter 1969.
Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts, Gift of Frank Stella (PA 1954).
Art © Donald Judd Foundation / VAGA New York and DACS, London 2004

To Susan Buckwalter

Although Judd continued to make handmade objects, he also began to have works constructed by fabricators. By using industrial materials and manufacturing processes, he wanted to eradicate evidence of the artist’s hand. To Susan Buckwalter (1964) introduces galvanised iron, a material he liked because it had no art historical context yet had a painterly quality in the way the light caught its surface pattern. Four metal boxes, hung at regular intervals on the wall are connected by a lacquered aluminium pipe inset into the top front edges. The spaces between the boxes have as much presence as the boxes themselves, and emphasise the depth from front to back. The alternation of open and enclosed volumetric spaces, and sequences of identical components, was to become a feature of Judd’s work.

previous  |  next