ART-PRESENTATION:Selections from the Kramarsky Collection
A selection of drawings from the Sarah-Ann and Werner H. (“Wynn”) Kramarsky Collection, is on exhibition at David Zwirner Gallery. Since the late 1950s, Wynn Kramarsky has amassed one of the most significant privately held collections of works on paper from the second half of the twentieth century, with a particular emphasis on Minimal, Post-Minimal, Conceptual, and process-oriented works.
By Efi Michalarou
Photo: David Zwirner Gallery Archive
For Wynn Kramarsky, assembling this collection over several decades has been a true labor of love, and his passion for collecting is reflected in this carefully curated selection of drawings by a wide-ranging group of artists. Wynn’s focus has been works on paper, at first since this type of work was more accessible to him as a young collector, but ultimately because he found drawings and other works on paper allowed for a more intimate engagement with an artist and his or her creative process. The smaller scale also enabled him to collect both encyclopedically and in-depth. Wynn’s non-commercial exhibition space, The Fifth Floor Foundation, which operated from 1991 to 2006 in New York’s. Comprising works from the 1960s through the 2000s, the selection of drawings included in this exhibition provides an overview of the evolution of abstract tendencies in American art-making over half a century and lays out a genealogy of succeeding styles, from Minimalism forward. Numerous important Minimalist artists are represented in the collection, evidencing the extreme heterogeneity of styles, subjects, and approaches that fall under this broad designation. Other works, while minimal in appearance, reveal themselves upon closer inspection to be more concerned with the process of their own making than with strict formal investigations. To create From “Untitled” Painting (1964-65), a dark amorphous cloud of charcoal on paper, Jasper Johns imprinted his own oil-covered face against paper, rolling it from one side to the other, and then rubbing charcoal over the paper to create an indexical trace of his body in motion. Another work by Hesse, Right After from 1969, made following her first operation for a brain tumor and less than a year before her untimely death, displays both her mastery of gouache and her unique understanding of form with its precisely rendered interlocking shapes. Still other artists employ words and symbols to drive their conceptual overtures. A 1979 drawing by Ed Ruscha,”Gray Sex”, uses gray pastel to faintly spell out the word “sex” in negative space, prompting the viewer to freely associate words, colors, sensations, and ideas. The Kramarsky Collection also includes examples by a number of artists who create works on paper as part of their ongoing painterly investigations. This exhibition includes highlights from the collection, with diverse and exemplary works by: Carl Andre, Robert Barry, Mel Bochner, Trisha Brown, John Cage, Bruce Conner, Dan Flavin, Suzan Frecon, Eva Hesse, Nancy Holt, Jasper Johns, Donald Judd, Ellsworth Kelly, Barry Le Va, Sol LeWitt, Robert Mangold, Brice Marden, Agnes Martin, Bruce Nauman, Ed Ruscha, Robert Ryman, Fred Sandback, Alan Saret, Richard Serra, Robert Smithson, Keith Sonnier, Richard Tuttle, Cy Twombly, Lawrence Weiner, and others.
Info: “Selections from The Kramarsky Collection”, David Zwirner Gallery, 537 West 20th Str.,New York, Duration: 2/5-20/6/15, Days & Hours: Tue-Sat: 10:00-18:00, www.davidzwirner.com
