Dan Flavin is one of the most remarkable and influential artists of the last century. His creative pursuits sought the near-elimination of any canvas or support, and his first major step toward this simplification resulted in a series of works from the early 1960s known as the “Icons”. These “Icons” comprise Masonite supports painted in a single color, onto which Flavin attached incandescent bulbs and fluorescent fixtures.
Flavin’s explorations culminated in what is considered his breakthrough work. Completed in 1963, Diagonal of May 25, 1963 (to Constantin Brâncusi) consists of a single fluorescent lamp installed diagonally on the wall, a tribute to “Endless Column” (1938) by the Romanian sculptor Constantin Brâncusi (1876-1957).
Following the creation of Diagonal of May 25, 1963 (to Constantin Brâncusi), Flavin produced a series of installations—or “situations”, as he would refer to them—of light and color that completely redefined their surrounding space. In this manner, architecture assumed a vital role, granting the frequently ignored or discarded corners of exhibit spaces essential value.
Diagonal of May 25, 1963 (to Constantin Brâncusi) was not only the high point of a search for formal minimalism; it initiated an intimate and lifelong dialogue between Flavin and a number of the major artists of the 20th century, some of whom were his contemporaries and even personal friends. These works reveal, more eloquently than any of Flavin’s other creations, how crucial color was to his practice. Having willfully reduced the role of the supporting material to its minimum, he would now rely entirely on the color and title of each piece to sustain his dialogues.
"Dedications to Artists", Cayón, 2018.
"Dedications to Artists", Cayón, 2018.
Furthermore, these sculptures, comprised of fluorescent lamps and devoted to some thirty artists, establish a clear relationship between the colors employed by this North American artist and those that characterize the compositions to which they refer. The brilliance of Flavin’s white lamps, for example, suggests the delicacy found in the works of Sol LeWitt and Cy Twombly, while the opacity of his black fluorescent fixtures echoes the monumental near-monochromatic installations of Ad Reinhardt. Flavin’s combinations of red, blue, and yellow remind us, unerringly, of Piet Mondrian and “Sandy” Calder, as well as Barnett Newman’s near-iconic iterations of Who’s Afraid of Red, Yellow and Blue.
This exhibit, which will open in Galería Cayón’s two locations in Blanca de Navarra coinciding with ARCOmadrid 2018, presents sixteen works conceived as corner, diagonal, horizontal, and vertical wall installations. The selection of these works was not guided by formal concerns or space considerations. Instead, it was designed to reflect, rigorously, Flavin’s series of tributes to artists of his own century.
