Doug Wheeler
dal 5/2/2014 al 28/3/2014
Segnalato da
5/2/2014
Doug Wheeler
David Zwirner, New York
Known for the seminal light environments that he developed in the 1960s and 70s, Wheeler presents a new type of installation that he calls a "rotational horizon work", which will occupy the ground floor gallery.
David Zwirner is pleased to present a new installation
by American artist Doug Wheeler (b. 1939) at our 537 W.
20th Street location. This will be the gallery’s second solo
exhibition of the artist’s work. Known for the seminal light
environments that he developed in the 1960s and 70s,
Wheeler will present a new type of installation that he calls
a “rotational horizon work,” which will occupy the ground
floor gallery. Connected visually and conceptually to his
previous works, this immersive environment will emphasize
the viewer’s physical experience of space, focusing attention
on the way light almost imperceptibly changes along the
horizon as the earth turns.
An avid flyer since childhood and an eventual pilot himself, Wheeler has long been fascinated by the illusory
quality of landscape as glimpsed from the vantage point of an airplane. Approaching an ever-receding horizon,
passengers are able to watch the terrain shift rapidly as though it were a stage set laid out flatly in front of them
when, in actuality, their flight path traces out the contours of the globe. By mimicking the sensation of the earth’s
rotational pull and curvature, Wheeler alters the traditionally static viewing experience of a work of art, thereby
destabilizing our innate sense of equilibrium and imparting the feeling of moving with the earth towards an
unreachable horizon.
Wheeler’s first solo exhibitions were held at the Pasadena Art Museum (1968), Ace Gallery, Venice, California
and Vancouver (1969), and Galerie Schmela, Düsseldorf (1970). His work was included in a number of important
exhibitions, including Larry Bell, Robert Irwin, Doug Wheeler (Tate Gallery, London, 1970); Rooms (The Institute
for Art and Urban Resources at P.S.1, Long Island City, New York, 1976); Ambiente/Arte (37th Venice Biennale,
1976); The First Show: Paintings and Sculpture from Eight Collections 1940-1980 (Museum of Contemporary Art,
Los Angeles, 1983); and Sunshine and Noir: Art in LA 1960-1997, (Louisiana Museum, Denmark, Kunstmuseum
Wolfsburg, and Armand Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 1997-1998) among others. More recently, Wheeler’s
work was presented in Singular Forms (Sometimes Repeated): Art from 1951 to the Present (Solomon R.
Guggenheim Museum, New York, 2004); Selections from the Collection of Helga and Walther Lauffs (Zwirner
& Wirth/David Zwirner, 2008); Time & Place: Los Angeles 1957-1968 (Moderna Museet, Stockholm, 2008-2009);
Primary Atmospheres: Works from California 1960-1970 (David Zwirner, 2010); Phenomenal: Light, Space, Surface,
a part of the Getty Research Institute’s Pacific Standard Time initiative (Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego,
2012); and Light Show (Hayward Gallery, London, 2013). In April 2014, Wheeler will install a new environment at
Palazzo Grassi in Venice.
Work by the artist is held in major museum collections, including the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam; the Museum
of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the Los Angeles County
Museum of Art; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C.; the Museum of Contemporary
Art, San Diego; and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Wheeler lives and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
On the occasion of the exhibition, David Zwirner will publish the first extensive monograph devoted to the artist’s
work. The publication will contain rare archival documentation as well as new scholarship on the artist by art
historian Germano Celant.
Reservations to view the exhibition are available; contact the gallery: 212-517-8677
Image: No Title, 2013 © Doug Wheeler 2014
David Zwirner
537 West 20th Street New York, NY 10011
Gallery hours: Tuesday – Saturday, 10 AM – 6 PM