Richard SerraAmerican, 1938–2024Weights and Measures
May one see it?
Not receiving at present
Art Institute of Chicago
Chicago, United States
It belongs to the collection, but is not on display at present.
- Checked
- In this state since
- Source
- The museum
About the sculpture
Capturing the raw, muscular energy required to work with lead and steel, Richard Serra began utilizing these materials in the late 1960s to explore the fundamental properties of sculptural tension. In 1968 he created his first “props,” consisting of plates and tubes, which fall into one of four categories—wall, corner, freestanding, or post-and-lintel. These sculptures entail a stable but unnerving performance of balance. A wall prop made of steel, Weights and Measures is not only visually striking but also physically imposing, experienced as much through the viewer’s sense of his or her own body as through vision. This work is a monumental form created from dense sheets that are not welded or joined; the result is a disquieting, even aggressive sculptural experience. Physical proximity and the sense of precariously balanced weight create a remarkably immediate relationship between space, object, and viewer.
Art Institute of ChicagoCC BY 4.0
Particulars
- Accession number
- 2007.636
In the catalog
Sources
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Image: Art Institute of Chicago — © the artist or rights holder
Meanwhile, in the life of Richard Serra
The whole life1986
First retrospective at MoMA
The first retrospective of his work is held at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The same year he also has a solo exhibition at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art in Humlebæk.
12 June 1987 – 20 September 1987
Exhibition: documenta 8
15 March 1989
The removal of “Tilted Arc”
The sculpture meets resistance from workers in the Federal building; after an eight-year campaign to remove it, “Tilted Arc” is taken down. Serra argued that the work was made for that site and that moving it meant destroying it, and said that if it were relocated he would deny his authorship and regard it as a “derivative work.”
