Torqued Ellipses
Tag: Richard Serra
Running Arcs (For John Cage)
Band
Berlin Junction
In 2019, we traveled to Germany for the Centennial of the founding of the Bauhaus, visiting Weimar, Dessau, and Berlin. Our friend Robert, who I mentioned as our impetus to visit Spain in 2004, starting this Richard Serra diary, joined us in Berlin for 4 days. While in Berlin, trying to stay out of the rain, we discovered Berlin Junction by Serra.
I love the juxtaposition of Serra’s curves with Hans Scharoun’s Berlin Philharmonie
Sequence
Sequence is in the collection of San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and was on display when Jane and I visited in August 2017. It’s a lot of everything: touchable, photographable, walkable, huge, heavy, squeezing, tall
Equal
In New York City at David Zwirner in Summer of 2015. Equal consists of eight 40-ton cubes of forged steel.
Wake
This is from Spring 2015 during an office retreat event at the Seattle Art Museum’s Olympic Sculpture Park.
Meet Me in St. Louis, Joe
In 2006 I found that I had Southwest Airlines miles that were about to expire, and the Pulitzer Foundation in St. Louis had an exhibit of Hiroshi Sugimoto’s photographs of Richard Serra’s Joe. All of this housed in the Pulitzer Foundation’s building by Tadao Ando!
I spent almost the entire day there, wandering inside and out. They didn’t allow photographs inside, but Joe was outside, just guarded very carefully to stop anyone from touching it! I spent so much time there, chatting with staff, that a guard offered to show me the non-public spaces of the building. But still no pictures inside.
Searching for Richard Serra
In our 2006 visit to Dia Beacon, I wandered into the room with Richard Serra’s Torqued Ellipses, and immediately feeling a sense of weightlessness in response to the weight of those 3 pieces in that seemingly small room. I floated!
Alas, they too did not allow photographs of the galleries, so I have this one to support my memory of buoyancy.
Bilbao Squeeze
In 2004 we traveled to Spain to visit our friend Robert, who had moved from Portland to Madrid a couple years before. Jane and I flew from Madrid to Bilbao on our own to see Frank Gehry’s Guggenheim Museum, along with Richard Serra’s work installed inside. Being squeezed between the walls of Serra’s Snake will always be a lasting memory. In the years before social media, photography in many museums and galleries was not allowed. This view of the Guggenheim from under the bridge is a similar squeeze!
Sanslartigue 2 