Richard Serra: Forged Rounds and Reverse Curve at Gagosian

RICHARD SERRA – Reverse Curve, 2005/2019 – Weatherproof steel –Overall: 13′ 1 1/2″ x 99′ 9″ x 19′ 7″; Plate: 2″ thick
© 2019 Richard Serra/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Cristiano. Courtesy Gagosian.

New York, USA – From Richard Serra’s New York City hat trick this autumn at Gagosian, I have only seen the Chelsea sculpture shows, Reverse Curve and Forged Rounds (Triptychs and Diptychs are up at Madison Ave).

Forged Rounds at 24th street was joyous- mind you, this is not a word I often associate with Serra. Massive 50-ton forged steel cylinders – you have to love Serra’s matter of fact naming of his installations – are presented in two galleries en masse and have a fugitive effect in both arrangement and surface detail (works titled “Nine” and “Combined and Separated”).

The logic behind the installation in the small, front gallery space is spot-on: two rounds squeezed in with just enough room in the middle for one to scoot through.

In the back gallery, four rounds stacked two-by-two in the back (raise a glass to the folks who install this stuff) is deceptively simple: the stacks, one with a wide cylinder on the bottom and vice versa (hence the title, Inverted) activate each other such that one keeps moving around them, head leading around the bend, just to see what visually happens next between them. Well, nothing much happens, but the process of looking inescapably draws you in.

At the 21st street gallery, Reverse Curve takes up the entire space and is one serpentine sprawl of weatherproof steel at 9′ 9″ x 19′ 7” long, 13′ 1 1/2″ tall and 2” thick. Per the gallery, “Originally conceived in 2005 for a public project in Reggio Emilia, Italy, Reverse Curve is finally being realized for the first time.” Which goes to show how spoiled the New York City art-goer is: one walks into this show, stands back, walks (all the way) around, maybe pauses to linger on a specific splotch of color or patina (some bits look like velvet), waits a bit to get a shot without other people in it and walks out, getting on with the rest of the day. Pretty much anywhere else and this show would constitute an event, the sculpture a presence to bask in. As a friend said, it’s like you’ve seen it before. Which is kind of true, but not exactly.

The works and accompanying the gallery materials maintain the just-the-facts-mam rigor of classic minimalist presentation. It’s all who, what, where and how. For example, dimensions are furnished to the tenth of the centimeter. One of the forged rounds in Nine is 15.3 cm shorter than another but 7.6 cm larger in girth. The beauty of walking among the Forged Rounds is the experience of sensing these differences though not necessarily being able to pinpoint them.  You can “get” a Serra but not understand it. The same holds for Reverse Curve, but in an alienating fashion.

RICHARD SERRA – Combined and Separated, 2019 – Forged steel, Six rounds in two groups – 78″ high, 79 3/4″ diameter; 72″ high, 83″ diameter; 48″ high, 102″ diameter
© 2019 Richard Serra/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Rob McKeever. Courtesy Gagosian.

The fact that each of the Forged Rounds weighs 50 tons is not evident on its face. That’s a fact that the artist needs to feed you and that you then move around in your mind, like a hard candy.

The description provided for Inverted is almost poetic in its accuracy and concision.

Inverted, 2019
Forged steel, Four rounds, installed in two inverted stacks

Two: 48” (121.9 cm) high, 102” (259 cm) diameter;
Two: 54” (137.1 cm) high, 96” (243.8 cm) diameter;
Each stack: 102” (259 cm), 102” (259 cm) diameter

Funny thing is you see what you get and vice versa.

What meaning do these details provide, if any? Do you even care to notice, and if you do, what conclusion do you come to? Serra anticipates the viewer’s perplexity (bemusement?) by explaining at length in the gallery release that:

“Weight is a value for me—not that it is any more compelling than lightness, but I simply know more about weight than about lightness and therefore I have more to say about it, more to say about the balancing of weight, the diminishing of weight, the addition and subtraction of weight, the concentration of weight, the rigging of weight, the propping of weight, the placement of weight, the locking of weight, the psychological effects of weight, the disorientation of weight, the disequilibrium of weight, the rotation of weight, the movement of weight, the directionality of weight, the shape of weight.” If this does not weigh on you, I don’t know what will.

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Richard Serra Forged Rounds through December 7, 2019 at Gagosian W. 24th St.

Richard Serra Reverse Curve through February 1, 2020  at Gagosian W. 21st St.

RICHARD SERRA – Nine, 2019 – Forged steel – Nine rounds: 7’ (213.4 cm) high, 6’ 4 3/4” (194.9 cm) diameter; – 6’ 6” (198.1 cm) high, 6’ 7 3/4” (202.6 cm) diameter; – 6’ (182.9 cm) high, 6’ 11” (210.8 cm) diameter; – 5’6” (167.6 cm) high, 7’ 2” (218.4 cm) diameter; – 5’ (152.4 cm) high, 7’ 7” (231.1 cm) diameter; – 4’ 6” (137.2 cm) high, 8’ (243.8 cm) diameter; – 4’ (121.9 cm) high, 8’ 6” (259.1 cm) diameter; – 3’ 6 1/2’ (108 cm) high, 9’ (274.3 cm) diameter; – 3’ 2 1/4” (97.2 cm) high, 9’ 6” (289.6 cm) diameter
© 2019 Richard Serra/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Rob McKeever. Courtesy Gagosian.

RICHARD SERRA – Inverted, 2019 – Forged steel, Four rounds, installed in two inverted stacks – Two: 48” (121.9 cm) high, 102” (259 cm) diameter; – Two: 54” (137.1 cm) high, 96” (243.8 cm) diameter; – Each stack: 102” (259 cm), 102” (259 cm) diameter
© 2019 Richard Serra/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York. Photo: Rob McKeever. Courtesy Gagosian.

RICHARD SERRA – Forging of two rounds for a Serra sculpture, Buderus Edelstahl, Wetzlar, Germany, March 2019
Photo: Silke von Berswordt. Courtesy the artist and Gagosian