Accession Number
142566
Medium
Pen and black ink and colored pencils on white wove graph paper
Dimensions
43.3 × 55.8 cm (17 1/16 × 22 in.)
Classification
pen and ink drawings
Credit Line
Estate of Harold Joachim
Background & Context
Background Story
Dan Flavins Installation Plan for Art Institute Exhibition from 1977 is a working drawing on graph paper that documents the artists process for designing his fluorescent light installations, here planned for a specific exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago. Flavin, whose entire mature practice consisted of arrangements of commercially manufactured fluorescent light tubes, used graph-paper drawings like this one to plan the placement, color, and density of his installations before executing them in actual gallery spaces. The drawing combines pen and ink lines that describe the walls and architectural features of the exhibition space with colored pencil marks that indicate the positions and colors of the fluorescent units, creating a plan that is simultaneously a architectural diagram and a color study. The use of graph paper is characteristic of Flavins working method, with its preprinted grid standing in for the regular intervals at which fluorescent tubes would be mounted on the gallery walls. The Art Institute of Chicago was an important early institutional supporter of Flavins work, and this drawing documents the collaborative process between artist and museum that produced some of the most influential Minimalist installations of the 1970s. The drawing also reveals the degree to which Flavins seemingly simple installations were the product of careful planning and precise spatial calculation.
Cultural Impact
Flavins installation drawings are essential documents for understanding the working methods of one of Minimalisms most important artists, revealing that the apparent simplicity of his fluorescent installations was the product of rigorous spatial planning. They have influenced the way museums document and reconstruct site-specific installation art.
Why It Matters
A working drawing on graph paper by Flavin that maps the placement of fluorescent lights for an Art Institute exhibition, revealing the careful planning behind his seemingly simple installations and documenting the collaborative process of site-specific Minimalist art.
