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Eve Hesse at Hauser & Wirth in April
Here in the anteroom, two sculptures in papier maché and a small wall piece in Sculpmetal
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Last month Hauser & Wirth showed work in paper by Eva Hesse. The focus of the show consisted of so-called "test pieces"--small, dimensional sketches created in papier caché, which is paper that is pressed and adhered by tape or glue. Such work by a less iconic artist would never have seen the light of day. But because it is Hesse, we had the opportunity to peek into her process and thinking. Some of the folded forms and concave shapes looked as if they might have been molded over a body, like the hollow of a back or the curve of a shoulder; others, as if the artist was simply doing what her hands and the material allowed. Extraordinarily fragile now (they were made in 1969), they suggest what might have been. The works were displayed on a large table that took up the entire back gallery.
The anteroom held two sculptures and a small wall piece. These sculptures, in papier maché, and the wall piece, in Sculpmetal, are more recognizably Hessian.
Above, Inside II and Inside I, both 1967; acrylic, papier maché, sawdust, wood, cord and metal.
Inside views of the respective works below
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From the anteroom, above, we can look into the back gallery, below, where the test pieces were displayed on a large table
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Above and below, opposite views of the papier caché sculptures on the exhibition plinth. The works were scattered on a table the way they might have been in the artist's studio.
Additional: I wrote a long piece on Hesse's career retrospective at the Jewish Museum a few years ago. The post appeared in Two Artists Talking.
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