Images(2)

#9, New York, 1940

Maker Charles (Karl Joseph) Biederman (American, 1906-2004)

Date1940

MediumRelief construction of painted wood, partially painted glass, and colored (blue, red, yellow) fluorescent tubes

DimensionsOverall: 54 1/2 x 51 7/8 x 17 3/4 in. (138.4 x 131.8 x 45.1 cm)

Credit LineGift of Dr. Raymond F. Hedin and Lydia Elizabeth Hedin, Red Wing, Minnesota

Collections

Abstractions

Object number2002.23

Status

Not on view

Description

Website Text

The American Charles Biederman gained international recognition for what came to be called by the late 1940s Structurist art: an art relying on areas of flat color, geometric shape and the dynamics of line for its impact. In Paris in 1936–37, Biederman met artists associated with progressive European geometric abstraction, including Dutch De Stijl and Russian/German Constructivism. From this period he began working almost exclusively in the format of the non-objective relief construction, each a study in color relationships and interactions between volumes of mass and cavities of space.

#9, New York, 1940 also uses glass and electric lights, industrial and vernacular materials not traditionally associated with fine art sculpture. The fluorescent lamps—in the three primarily colors (red, yellow, blue) recalling De Stijl aesthetics—are invisible except for the hues they project over the white painted surfaces of the wooden relief elements. Discussing this innovative piece, Biederman wrote: “In this light Construction (which is the first one of its kind anywhere) you will notice that the surfaces are all white with the exception of black lines on the two glass surfaces; all the rest of the color is produced by colored lights.”