Dan Flavin — 1933-1996 — Nikki Diana Marquardt Gallery — Exhibition — Slash Paris

Past: January 16 → February 7, 2012

« I had to start from that blank almost featureless square fronted construction with obvious electric light which could become my standard yet variable emblem—« the icon » ».

Dan Flavin, Artforum 1965.

Dan Flavin is a self-taught artist. Seminarist by training, he gives up the priesthood and, after a military service in Korea and in 59 joins the history of the art courses at Columbia University. His very first works, produced in this time area entitled paints the “Icons” which are decorated with electric bulbs. Further to this first series, it will develop a research on light, he will underline himself, with " the catholic splendor ". Let us note for references that the iconic movie of this generation of minimalist artists was “La Notte” of Antonioni. From 1963, he starts working only with fluorescent tubes of industrial production which he assembles within installations. He will keep this artistic vocabulary until his last works. By investigating the variations that allow the number, the color, the dimensions of tubes and their arrangement, Dan Flavin works on the recollection of space and envisions the lighting as an inscription in the room or exhibition space. His work develops in a the variety of places for which he creates and enriches. He will show as well in museums such as the Guggenheim museum of New York, in 1971 and in 1992, or in more unexpected places or the church Santa Maria Annunciata of Milan, the arrangement of which was finished after its death in 1997. Dan Flavin remains one of most important minimalist’s artists and innovators of the 20th century. The essence of systematic reduction of the shape in sculpture as well as its discovery and the ceaseless exploration of the art of the installation and the light makes of him one of the American parents of the minimalism surrounded with Donald Judd, Carl André, Sol Le Witt, Richard Serra or Robert Morris. Nikki Diana Marquardt meets Dan Flavin in 1984, their meeting restores a new breath to the artist and she will show him for the first time in Paris in 1987 on the occasion of the opening of her Place des Vosges gallery space in a still uncultivated field for contemporary art galleries. The works selected to be presented in the Gallery project room from January 16th until February 7th, 2012 are friendly tributes from the artist to Nikki his then first vendor in Paris. A fluorescent prototype "Untitled (to Charlotte) " in homage to Nikki’s daughter or an exceptional drawing " Untitled (to Nikki) ", but also works on and some rare prints " To Don Judd colorist " presented during the show at the Gallery in 1987 and then at the Baden Baden Kunsthalle monumentary and historical exhibition in 1989.

Quotes

“A piece of wall can be visually disintegrated from the whole into a separate triangle by plunging a diagonal of light from edge to edge on the wall; that is, side to floor, for instance.”

“My icons do not raise up the blessed savior in elaborate cathedrals. They are constructed concentrations celebrating barren rooms. They bring a limited light.”

“For example, if you press an eight-foot fluorescent lamp into the vertical climb of a corner, you can destroy that corner by glare and doubled shadow.”

“Realizing this, I knew that the actual space of a room could be broken down and played with by planting illusions of real light (electric light) at crucial junctures in the room’s composition.”

“It is what it is, and it ain’t nothin’ else Everything is clearly, openly, plainly delivered. There is no overwhelming spirituality you are supposed to come into contact with. I like my use of light to be openly situational in the sense that there is no invitation to meditate, to contemplate. It’s in a sense a “get-in-get-out” situation. And it is very easy to understand. One might not think of light as a matter of fact, but I do. And it is, as I said, as plain and open and direct an art as you will ever find"