Skip to main content
Label Text This abstract, rough-surfaced sculpture is inspired by the movement of the human body-specifically gymnastics, as the title suggests. Created in 1985, the year after the Los Angeles Olympics, William Tucker cites the athletes on the rings and parallel bars as a visual source for this work, with a particular interest in the way their bodies become simplified into two moving and rigid halves. Gymnast III is not concerned with rendering the body realistically or the nuances of skin, muscle, and bone. Instead, Tucker attempts to manifest the body's physical sensations, such as fatigue, pain, exertion, stretching, or the force of hard landing. The work resides in a space between object and gesture, suggesting the body's most elemental shapes as well as its most visceral feelings.
Exhibition HistoryDavid McKee Gallery, "Gymnast", November 1985, cat. #6 (illustrated)
Published References"John and Mary Pappajohn Sculpture Park", Lea Rosson DeLong, ed., Des Moines Art Center, Des Moines, Iowa, 1923, pp. 134-135
DimensionsOverall: 87 × 58 × 32 in., 2000 lb. (221 × 147.3 × 81.3 cm, 907.2 kg.)
Accession Number 2015.26
Classificationssculpture
Edition2 of 3
Provenance(David McKee); John and Mary Pappajohn [purchased from previous, 1989]; Des Moines Art Center [gift from previous, 2015]

Images (1)

Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines

Audio (1)

Gymnast III
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Tony Cragg
1989
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Judith Shea
1990
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Joel Shapiro
1985
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Barry Flanagan
1997
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Louise Bourgeois
1997
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Deborah Butterfield
2009
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Deborah Butterfield
1989
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Anthony Caro
1986
Photo Credit: Richard Sanders, Des Moines
Masayuki Nagare
1965
Photo Credit: Rich Sanders, Des Moines
Willem de Kooning
1969-1982