Contingent (1969)
Eva Hesse created this post-minimalist art piece in 1969. Also, a little background about Post-Minimalism.
Post minimalism emerged in the late 60s early 70s and women in particular presented, materials and the materials drooped or sagged. They also rejected the Minimalists movement attitude: The minimalist were often perceived as cold, over intellectual, and authoritarian. The post-minimalist portrayed a culture of expressive qualities, often evoking the body and aspects of sexuality. The artistic tendency was a feminist art historian and art critic Lucy Lippard in 1966. She organized an art exhibition composed of artists working in the post-minimalist vein. Eva Hesse can be placed in many genres in the art world. She is considered both a Post-Minimalist and Feminist artist. Eva Hesse is a combination of process art in terms of medium and working methods. She lived a short life. She was 34 years old when she was diagnosed and died of a brain tumor. She lived a tragic life and she had a 10-year art-making career. In that 10 years, she contributed some important pieces that had a lot of influence on artists later. She was born in Germany and she was born right before the outbreak of World War II. She was born into a German-Jewish family and her parents saw that things were not going to go well. They put their babies on a train called Children Kinder-transport which transported them to the Netherlands. Later the parents connected with them and they made their way to the United States even though immigration at this point had become very tight and very difficult. Eva, at an early age, was brought to America. Her mother committed suicide after her father and mother divorced; she was 10 years old. She ended up marrying a man and they returned right after the war to Germany and they set up their studios in a textile mill. This ended up being important for them because Eva’s house was introduced to a lot of materials that she probably wouldn't have seen if she stayed in the United States. Contingent from 1969 is seen above. Contingent means something is hinged on something else working out. It's a series of 8 panels or units and these are latex over cheesecloth. Cheesecloth is a loose weave cloth and a light ephemeral fabric. It's very delicate and she's dipped it in latex and fiberglass to give it rigidity. Inherently it's going to drape because the cheesecloth itself is fragile and soft. It forms an organic series of units. You may recall Donald Judd's boxes mounted on a wall. Art historians and art critics would cast the minimalists as rigid, hard, and masculine. Post-Minimalist artists like Eva Hesse are seen as feminine and soft. An obvious contrast from Minimalism.
Thank you for Reading 2 of 4 in the Minimalist and Post Minimalist series! And I hope you have a great rest of your week! Next week we will be looking at Tony Smith.
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