Eva Hesse produced an extraordinarily original, influential body of work in her short career, pioneering the use of eccentric materials and idiosyncratic sculptural forms. Hesse considered Hang Up among her most important works because it was the first to achieve the level of “absurdity or extreme feeling” she intended. Produced at the height of Minimalism and the Pop Art movement but belonging to neither, the piece was fabricated by her friend the artist Sol LeWitt, and her husband, Tom Doyle, who wrapped the wood stretcher with bed sheets and attached the cord-covered steel tubing. Sealed with acrylic, the object is subtly shaded from pale to dark ash gray. It is an ironic sculpture about painting, privileging the medium’s marginal features: the frame and its hanging device, represented by the cord that protrudes awkwardly into the gallery. The title might be understood as a humorous instruction for the sculpture’s display but also acts on a more psychological level. Collapsing the space between the viewer and the artwork, Hang Up creates a sense of disorientation and toys with our ability to discern a clear demarcation between painting and sculpture.
Date
Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.
Robert Pincus–Witten and Linda Shearer, Eva Hesse: A Memorial Exhibition, exh. cat. (New York: Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, 1972), n.p., cat. 8 (color ill.).
Lucy R. Lippard, Strata: Nancy Graves, Eva Hesse, Michelle Stuart, Jackie Winsor, exh. cat. (Vancouver: Vancouver Art Gallery, 1977), 10, 13 (color ill.), 15, 29.
Nicholas Serota, Eva Hesse: Sculpture, exh. cat. (London: Whitechapel Art Gallery, 1979), cat. 7 (ill.).
Olle Granath and Margareta Helleberg, Flykpunkter/Vanishing Points, exh. cat. (Stockholm: Moderna Museet, 1984), 126 (ill.), 127.
Richard Armstrong and Richard Marshall, Entre la geometría y el gesto: escultura norteamericana, 1965-1975, exh. cat. (Madrid: Ministerio de Cultura, Direccion General de Bellas Artes y Archivos, Centro Nacional de Exposiciones, 1986), 30, pl. 66.1 (ill.).
Cornelia Butler, and others, Lisa Gabrielle Mark, ed., WACK!: Art and the Feminist Revolution, exh. cat. (Los Angeles: Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2007), 54 (color ill.), 245, 503.
Lucy R. Lippard, Veronica Roberts, and Kirsten Swenson, Converging Lines: Eva Hesse and Sol LeWitt, exh. cat. (New Haven: Blanton Museum of Art in association with Yale University Press, 2014), 60 (color ill.).
New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Eva Hesse: A Memorial Exhibition, Dec. 8, 1972–Feb. 11, 1973, cat. 8; Buffalo, NY, Albright–Knox Gallery Mar. 6–Apr. 22, 1973; Chicago, Museum of Contemporary Art, May 19–July 8, 1973; Pasadena, CA, Pasadena Art Museum Sept. 18–Nov. 11, 1973; Berkeley, CA: University Art Museum, University of California, Berkeley, until Feb. 3, 1974.
Vancouver, Vancouver Art Gallery, Nancy Graves, Eva Hesse, Michelle Stuart, Jackie Winsor, Oct. 9–Nov. 6, 1977, no cat. no.
London, Whitechapel Art Gallery, Eva Hesse: Sculpture, May 4–June 17, 1979, cat. 7; Otterlo, NL, Rijksmuseum Kröller–Müller, June 30–Aug. 5, 1979; Hannover, Kestner–Gesellschaft, Aug. 17–Sept. 23, 1979.
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, WACK!: Art and the Feminist Revolution, Mar. 4–July 16, 2007, no cat. no.; Washington D.C., National Museum of Women in the Arts, Sept. 21–Dec. 16, 2007; Long Island City, NY, P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center, Feb.17–May 12, 2008, Vancouver Art Gallery, Oct. 4, 2008–Jan. 11, 2009.
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