The neon master Dan Flavin (1933-1996) succeeded in producing works, or rather "situations", of great emotional intensity from extremely simple devices. The Kunstmuseum Basel is bringing together some of his major works.
Called The Diagonal of personal ecstasy, a simple neon light fixed diagonally to a wall by the self-taught artist (soon to be considered, along with Donald Judd, the pioneer of minimal art) marked a turning point in the history of contemporary art in May 1963. Not only was Dan Flavin taking color out of the two-dimensionality of the painting, he was also confusing it with light. "Dan Flavin quickly understood how space and the viewer's perception could be transformed by the power and dynamics of his tool, both light and color1.
"hyper-presence of the immaterial
Tangible and intangible, hypnotic and untouchable, dazzling and enveloping, metamorphosing the viewer's mental space and architectural space, his neon installations invariably seek to achieve the "hyperpresence of the immaterial 1 ". Arranged on the floor, wall, ceiling, corner, barrier or corridor, and available in four standard lengths and nine commercially available colors, the fluorescent tubes placed in situations (Dan Flavin himself described his art as "situational") are most often dedicated to other artists 2, when they don't refer to concrete events, such as the atrocities of war or police violence. Such is the case with the poignant Monument for those who have been killed in ambush (to P.K. who reminded me about death), dedicated to the memory of the dead from the Vietnam War, featuring a sheaf of glowing tubes piercing and saturating the space.
1 - Suzanne Pagé, curator of the Dan Flavin retrospective held in 2006 at the Musée d'Art Moderne in Paris.
2 - Such as Constantin Brancusi, Vladimir Tatlin, Jasper Johns and Barnett Newman.
March 2 to August 18, 2024
kunstmuseumbasel.ch
