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Floor Drawing #19 (Sentences III) investigates the interaction between a work of art and its surrounding space. Tuttle composed the work from a wide assortment of found materials, such as light bulbs and plywood, to blur the lines between art and everyday existence. This blurring, along with Tuttle’s humorous approach to art making (the red light bulbs are left off intentionally). This taste for commonplace materials, coupled with an appreciation for handmade, modest structures, defies a history of sculpture that is largely made of almost indestructible materials like stone and bronze, and can be difficult to understand or see as beautiful. What about this sculpture do you find yourself immediately connecting with - the materials, the color, or its playful, handmade assembly? What about this work’s creation mystifies you - its origin, its message, its relationship to traditional sculpture? Does the word “drawing” in the title offer any clues to the experimental feel of this work?

July 22, 2020


Exhibition History"Drawing the Question: Dan Asher, Eva Hesse, Ree Morton, Sol Lewitt, Sheila Pepe, and Richard Tuttle," Dorsky Gallery, New York, April 29 - June 20, 1998 (brochure)

"Richard Tuttle: Time/Line" Daniel Weinberg Gallery, San Francisco, CA, September 14 - October 31, 1995

"Richard Tuttle: Twenty Floor Drawings," Institute of Contemporary Art, Amsterdam, 1991 (catalogue)

"Domenico Bianchi, Robert Ryman, Richard Tuttle," Sperone Westwater, New York, September 16 - October 24, 1989
Published References"Richard Tuttle", exhibition catalogue, with foreward by Eduardo Lipschutz-Villa, essays by Susan Harris and Dieter Schwarz, and interview by Richard Marshall (Amsterdam: Institute of Contemporary Art, and the Hague: Sdu Publishers, 1991), pp. 40-41, 65 (illustrated)

"Just Exquisite? The Art of Richard Tuttle" "Artform, vol. 36 no. (November 1997), p. 90

"The Art of Richard Tuttle", edited by Madeleine Grynsztejn, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 2005, pgs. 275, 354
DimensionsOverall: 72 × 42 × 35 in. (182.9 × 106.7 × 88.9 cm)
Accession Number 2000.16
Classificationssculpture
CopyrightRichard Tuttle, courtesy The Pace Gallery
ProvenanceArtist. (Sperone Westwater Gallery, New York); Des Moines Art Center [purchased from the previous, 2000]

Images (1)

Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines

Audio (1)

Floor Drawing #19 (Sentences III)
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
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Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
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Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
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Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
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