Page 36 - Studio International - December 1972
P. 36

NOTES ON AN EXPOSITION OF CORNERED INSTAL


      SET TO CELEBRATE TEN YEARS OF THE ALBRIGHT-




      James N. Wood




      In 1905 a white marble building designed by   connecting the exhibition space of both. It was   finally selected set of To Donna variations (an
      Edward B. Green, which was destined to    this staircase and a second gallery in the old   `a' group reversal of side colours) which I've
      become a landmark of the Greek revival style in   building that Dan Flavin was asked to illuminate   been concentratedly researching periodically
      the United States, was dedicated as the new   on the tenth anniversary of the Albright-Knox   since last summer, with test expositions in Los
      home of The Buffalo Fine Arts Academy. In   Art Gallery.                            Angeles (in Doug Christmas's Ace Gallery) and
      1962 the Albright-Knox Art Gallery opened   Flavin's final proposal was the following:   in New York (in the Leo Castelli Gallery).
      with a total space roughly double that of the   'What I have in mind to displayis in two parts,   'The "Donna" of the dedication is a young,
      original Academy as the result of a new building   the first, for one gallery, is three near-square   handsome, intelligent Angelino who has worked
      designed by Gordon Bunshaft of Skidmore,   cornered installations, each eight feet high, each   with the Ace Gallery and in film-making.
      Owings and Merrill. As divergent in style as the   in different combinations of pink, yellow and   'It seems to me that the difficult, somewhat
      dates of their construction would suggest, these   blue; of forelighting from horizontal single strips,   vulgar pink, yellow, and blue that I've combined
      two buildings epitomize the late 19th- and   top and bottom, with same coloured tubes and   for these installations could be located
      mid-20th-century conceptions of museum    back lighting from vertically sided two-lighters   somewhere, maybe anywhere, in Los Angeles.
      architecture. The point of contact between the   of like-coloured pairs of tubes, which clearly   Tor the staircase which permits people to go
      two is a frank recognition of opposites, modified   cross-project each other to opposite walls behind   between the old and new galleries, is an
      primarily at one point: the interior staircase    the framing structure. Together, they are a    appropriately tall installation most peculiar to




























































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