Carl Andre
Sculpture by Carl Andre will be on display at the Paula Cooper Gallery from January 7th through February 19th, 2022. The exhibition will include works dating from 1976 to 2021 in a variety of materials, including wood, copper, granite, limestone, steel, copper, and brick.
Andre started his career in 1958-1959 carving timbers, using a chisel or saw to create abstract pieces with geometric patterns. These early works recalled both the verticality and symmetry of Brancusi’s sculptures and the logic of the paintings of Frank Stella, whose studio Andre was sharing at the time. In 1960, Andre started his Elements series, using timbers of equal size in various configurations. This series marks the moment when Andre definitively abandoned the manipulation of materials.
Exhibited for the first time, 5VCEDAR5H (2021) is Andre’s newest timber work. Positioned against a wall and arranged alternately upright and on their side, ten blocks of cedar play with verticality and mass. Manet Post and Lintel (1980) is comprised of similarly proportioned forms in granite, quarried in Quincy, Massachusetts, where Andre was born. A single horizontal block positioned atop two identical vertical forms gestures in the simplest terms towards architectural principles and geographical origins. Two floor-bound sculptures comprised of red sandstone bricks from Scotland and blue limestone from Belgium spread their elemental forms close to the ground. A steel plate piece takes the floor, and a scatter of small wooden squares joins the horizontal plane in an unpredictable constellation.
In the smaller gallery, works by other artists complement Andre’s sculpture in materiality and form. A concrete bowl with a vivid blue interior by Jackie Winsor sits between wall-mounted relief sculpture by Hans Haacke and Luciano Fabro, and a carboard composition by Jan Schoonhoven. In the street-level vitrine is Andre’s Merrymount (1980), a stepped pyramid of horizontal timbers.
The Carl Andre and Melissa L. Kretschmer Foundation and Dr. Eva Meyer-Hermann are currently preparing a Catalogue Raisonné of Carl Andre Sculpture in collaboration with Cahiers d'Art Institute (CDAI), and with the support of the Paula Cooper Gallery, New York, and the Konrad Fischer Galerie, Düsseldorf/Berlin. Current and past owners of sculpture by Carl Andre are encouraged to register their works with the Foundation, Konrad Fischer Galerie, or Paula Cooper Gallery. For more information, visit the dedicated page on the artist's website.