Primary Structures

This article may require copy-editing for grammar, style, cohesion, tone or spelling. You can assist by editing it. (August 2008)

This article contains weasel words, vague phrasing that often accompanies biased or unverifiable information. Such statements should be clarified or removed. (October 2008)

Exhibit Catalog Cover designed by Elaine Lustig Cohen

Primary Structures: Younger American and British Sculpture, April 27 - June 12, 1966 at the Jewish Museum in New York, was organized by the museum's Curator of Painting and Sculpture, Kynaston McShine. This exhibit was a critical and media success as reported in Time^[1] and Newsweek^[2], presenting the public with a show dedicated to a "New Art". This art has been given many titles including ABC art, Reductive art and most popularly, Minimalism^[3]. The labels have been roundly rejected by its practitioners, notably Donald Judd, but the techniques applied by the participating artists not only introduced stripped-down forms, but also presented new materials with smooth, shiny surfaces and the concept of artist as "designer", not necessarily "maker". During a forum conducted at the museum, Kynaston McShine, Barbara Rose, Donald Judd, Robert Morris, and Mark di Suvero discussed the "New Sculpture". di Suvero famously remarked, "Primary Structures is the key show of the 1960s...", and also, "...my friend Donald Judd cannot qualify as an artist because he doesn't do the work", to which Judd replied, "...The point is not whether one makes the work or not... I don't see... why one technique is any more essentially art than another..."^[4] It can be argued that this show ushered in a radical new way of presenting ideas and space that did not rely on the artist's hand yet rather on the final result.

The exhibit did have its detractors as McShine, in an effort to broaden appeal and show a wide variety of artists working in this form, included a West coast contingent and most of the British artists from the "New Generation" show at the Whitechapel Art Gallery from 1965. It appeared that Primary Structures was to be formulated around Anthony Caro's former St. Martin's students and the American group led by a relatively unknown elder statesman, Tony Smith.

In 1989, a major expansion and renovation project was undertaken at the museum. Upon completion in June 1993, the layout of the Primary Structures show was history and only a few installation shots of the show remain to record the exhibit and the old galleries. Some of McShine's Primary Structures galleries were considered very powerful (Gallery 5) while others seemed to contain "leftovers" (Gallery 10).

This exhibit will be remembered as a turning point in contemporary sculpture and for McShine's foresight by including artists that turned out to be successful provocateurs as artists, teachers and writers.

Listing

Sculpture Court/Entry

• David Annesley, Swing Low, 1964
• Anthony Caro, Titan, 1964
• Tony Smith, Free Ride, 1962

Lobby

• Judy Cohen Gerowitz (Judy Chicago), Rainbow Picket, 1966
• Robert Smithson, Cryosphere, 1966

Gallery 1

• Dan Flavin, corner monument 4 for those who have been killed in ambush (for Jewish Museum) (for *P.K. who reminded me about death), 1964
• Peter Forakis, JFK, 1963
• Ellsworth Kelly, Blue Disc, 1963
• Forrest Myers, Zygarat & W. & W.W.W., 1965
• Salvatore Romano, Zeno II, 1965
• William Tucker, Meru I, 1964
• William Tucker, Meru II, 1964
• William Tucker, Meru III, 1964-65
• David von Schlegell, Wave, 1964

Underpass

• Gerald Laing, Indenty, 1966
• Gerald Laing, Trace, 1965
• Tina Matkovic (Spiro), Projection, 1965

Gallery 2

• Carl Andre, Lever, 1966
• Lyman Kipp, Andy's Cart Blanche
• Tim Scott, Peach Wheels, 1962
• Richard Van Buren, Free Epton, 1966
• Isaac Witkin, Nagas, 1964

Gallery 3

• Tony DeLap, Ka, 1965
• Tom Doyle, Over Owl's Creek, 1966

Gallery 4

• Richard Artschwager, Table with Pink Tablecloth, 1964
• Richard Artschwager, Rocker, 1965-75
• Michael Bolus, No. 6, 1965
• Paul Frazier, Pink Split, 1965
• Douglas Huebler, Bradford 2-66, 1966
• John McCracken, Northumberland, 1965
• Peter Phillips, Tricurvular, 1964-65
• Anne Truitt, Sea Garden, 1964

Gallery 5

• Ronald Bladen, Three Elements, 1965
• Robert Grosvenor, Transoxiana, 1965
• Donald Judd, Untitled, floor 1966
• Donald Judd, Untitled, wall 1966
• Robert Morris, Untitled (L Beams),^[5] 1966-67

Gallery 8

• Larry Bell, Untitled(peach)
• Larry Bell, Untitled(pink)
• Larry Bell, Untitled(gold)
• Walter de Maria, Cage,^[6] 1961-65
• Sol LeWitt, Untitled, 1966

Gallery 10

• Daniel Gorski, Fourth Down
• David Gray, LA/2, 1965
• David Hall, Izzard, 1966
• Phillip King, Through, 1966
• John McCracken, Manchu, 1965
• Peter Pinchbeck, Space Jump
• Michael Todd, Viet, 1966
• Michael Todd, Ball Joint,^[7] 1966
• Derrick Woodham, Siviley, 1965

Notes

1. ^ Time magazine, June 3, 1966, "Engineer's Esthetic", pg64
2. ^ Newsweek magazine, May 16, 1966, "The New Druids", pg104
3. ^ See Battcock's, Minimal Art: A Critical Anthology
4. ^ See Meyer's, Minimalism for a partial transcript
5. ^ Exhibit catalog lists Morris' Floor Piece as the expected work
6. ^ Exhibit images have also illustrated Cage in Gallery 5
7. ^ Although listed in the catalog, inclusion of this piece has not been confirmed

References

• Altshuler, Bruce, The Avant-Garde in Exhibition: New Art in the 20th century (Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1994). ISBN 0-8109-3637-2
• Battcock, Gregory ed., Minimal Art: A Critical Anthology (E.P Dutton & Co, Inc., 1968). ISBN 0-525-47211-8.
• Goldtsein, Ann, A Minimalist Future? Art as Object 1958-1968 (MIT Press, 2004). ISBN 0-914357-87-5
• McShine, Kynaston, Primary Structures: Younger American and Bristish Sculptors (Jewish Museum: New York, 1966)
• Meyer, James, Minimalism: Art and Polemics of the Sixties (Yale University Press, 2000). ISBN 0-300-10590-8
• Meyer, James ed., Minimalism (Phaidon Press Limited, 2000). ISBN 0-7148-4523-X