A few weeks ago, when I saw something figural or human-scaled in some columnar Rachel Harrison sculptures in Dijon that also reminded me of Anne Truitt’s columns, I had to also realize I’d been embarrassingly bitchy about Blake Gopnik reading Anne Truitt’s sculptures the same way once in the Washington Post.
Well, since then, a very archivally minded Truitt admirer sent me an even earlier review of a Truitt show that makes exactly the same point. A review written by Rachel Harrison.
I was just going to quote the part where Harrison compared visiting the show at Danese to arriving at a party where the guests were all wearing deceptively monochrome outfits, but then it turns out neither the show, nor the gallery, nor the review, not even the installation photo of three new (2001-02) sculptures are available online. So I’m posting a scan above and the full text after the jump, and will beg Harrison’s lawyers for forgiveness if they come calling.
The irony is, when I received this old review, I was sure I’d blogged about it and forgotten it. I did not. I’d misremembered a Times review about Truitt and Agnes Martin having simultaneous shows across the street from each other. But Time Out was huge at the time, and I’m still convinced it was the beginning of my awareness of Harrison’s appreciation of Truitt, which was in turn instrumental in my appreciation of Harrison.
Anne Truitt
Danese (through Feb. 8)
“The main room of Anne Truitt’s current exhibition consists of 11 five to seven-foot high painted rectangular columns. Truitt has chosen a challenging palette: rich muddy brown, safety orange, kelly green, bubble-gum pink, deep purple. With the exception of two multihued forms (one red and black; the other a combination of white, beige, black, pale blue and green), all the sculptures on view are monochrome. Or so it first appears. Closer inspection reveals an ultra thin border of contrasting color at the base of many of these forms.
“Visiting this show is a bit like arrive at a party to find almost everyone dressed head-to-toe in a single color. Except there’s one man in a blue-and-black striped suit (the intensity of which suggests plaid since the red and black are so committed and intertwined) and one woman in a loud print dress (jazzed unequal stripes of beige, green, black, blue and white). Their outfits seem too elaborate for this context. Maybe they’re at the wrong party? But after a while you realize that everyone is much more elegantly and pointedly dressed than you’d originally assumed. The all-pink person is wearing red shoes, and that tiny sliver of crimson completely transforms the way the pink resonates. Rarely does one see this sort of sophisticated complexity in sculpture: the integration of extremely reductive classical form with decorative and playful vivid color.
“In the early 1960s, Truitt’s work was hotly contested by major figures such as Donald Judd, who gave her 1963 solo debut at Andre Emmerich a nasty review.
Clement Greenberg, on the other hand, hailed her as the “inventor” of Minimal art. But Truitt never fit comfortably into the Minimalist canon. Her sculptures have always been intensely personal, meticulously hand-painted and more concerned with the way color and form interact than with mounting or winning any grand theoretical argument.
“Perhaps her work is less well known than that of other artists from her generation because it is so idiosyncratic and rigorous. (Being a woman back then certainly didn’t help either.) We can only hope that Truitt will make a comeback and take her rightful place in history alongside the Big Boys. In the meantime, you can thoroughly enjoy this underground gem of a show.
— Rachel Harrison”
Previously, related: Art is about the long run