Richard Serra American, 1938-2024
Overview
Elevational Weights, Vertical Mass, 2010
"Obsession is what it comes down to. It is difficult to think without obsession, and it is impossible to create something without a foundation that is rigorous, incontrovertible, and, in fact, to some degree repetitive. Repetition is the ritual of obsession. Repetition is a way to jumpstart the indecision of beginning. To persevere and to begin over and over again is to continue the obsession with work. Work comes out of work. In order to work you must already be working". — RICHARD SERRA
Born in San Francisco, Serra lived and worked in New York and Nova Scotia. He rose to prominence with his first major solo show at the Leo Castelli Warehouse in 1969 and went on to exhibit at leading institutions around the globe. Serra’s large-scale, site-specific sculptures remain iconic contributions to contemporary art and architecture, reshaping how we experience form and environment.
Serra’s sculptures and drawings have been celebrated with two retrospectives at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, twenty years apart: Richard Serra/Sculpture (1986) and Richard Serra Sculpture: Forty Years (2007). He had solo exhibitions at the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (1977–78); Kunsthalle Tübingen, Germany (1978); Staatliche Kunsthalle Baden-Baden, Germany (1978); Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen, Rotterdam, Netherlands (1980, 2014, and 2017); Centre Pompidou, Paris (1983–84); Museum Haus Lange, Krefeld, Germany (1985); Louisiana Museum, Humlebæk, Denmark (1986); Westfälisches Landesmuseum für Kunst und Kulturgeschichte, Münster, Germany (1987); Städtische Galerie im Lenbachhaus, Munich (1987); Stedelijk Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, Netherlands (1988); Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht, Netherlands (1990); Kunsthaus Zürich (1990); CAPC Musée d’Art Contemporain, Bordeaux, France (1990); Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid (1992); Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf, Germany (1992); Dia Center for the Arts, New York (1997); Centro de Arte Hélio Oiticica, Rio de Janeiro (1997–98); Trajan’s Market, Rome (1999–2000); Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis (2003); and Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli, Naples, Italy (2004).
Works
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Elevational Weights, Vertical Mass, 2010
Press
Exhibitions
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LEVEL PART II
Laffanour Galerie Downtown Paris 3 - 26 Oct 2024Laffanour | Galerie Downtown is delighted to unveil the exhibition “LEVEL Part II”, inRead more
collaboration with Charles Riva Collection and François Laffanour and collector and curator Charles Riva bring together contemporary artworks by international artists with iconic pieces by 20th-century designers during Art Basel Paris -
LEVEL
Group Exhibition - Brussels 18 Apr - 1 Jul 2023Charles Riva is particularly fond of this idea of putting works of different origins in relation, which stems from his desire to break away from the white cube concept which is typical for contemporary art galleries. The collaboration with François Laffanour, whom he has known for a long time, was therefore a natural choice: a cross between furniture and graphic arts, mutually enriching each other, with pieces of exceptional quality, hence the ambitious title of the exhibition LEVEL.Read more
The exhibition presents on one hand, modern design, with major figures such as Jean Prouvé, Pierre Jeanneret and Le Corbusier, enhanced with some poetic design pieces by contemporary Korean designer, Choï Byung Hoon. On the other hand, the public will discover a selection of works by contemporary American artists such as Paul McCarthy, Richard Prince and the conceptual artist Christopher Woo. The exhibition creates an aesthetic complementarity between these two worlds, under the watchful eye of François Laffanour and Charles Riva. Through this collaboration, the duo implement the vision of art they share: to enhance the works by contextualizing them, by creating real living spaces at the crossroads of interior architecture.
