eva hesse art
Eva Hesse, Untitled, 1960, oil on canvas, 124,82 x 124,82 cm, 49.14 x 49.14 in., © The Estate of Eva Hesse
Eva Hesse, Ringaround Arosie, 1965, pencil, acetone, varnish, enamel paint, ink, and cloth covered electrical wire on papier-mâché and masonite, 67 x 41.9 x 11.4 cm, © MoMA, © The Estate of Eva Hesse
After Yale, Hesse returned to New York [14] , where she became friends with many other young minimalist artists, including Sol LeWitt, Donald Judd, Yayoi Kusama, and others. [15] Her close friendship with Sol LeWitt continued until the end of her life. [16] The two frequently wrote to one another, and in 1965 LeWitt famously counseled a young doubting Eva to “Stop [thinking] and just DO!” [17] Both Hesse and LeWitt went on to become influential artists; their friendship stimulated the artistic development of their work. [18]
In October 1969, she was diagnosed with a brain tumor, and she died on May 29, 1970, after three failed operations within a year. [9] Her death at the age of 34 ended a career that would become highly influential, despite spanning only a decade. [10]
Born into a German Jewish family, Hesse was about three years old when her parents left their extended family behind and fled the Nazi regime, arriving in New York City in 1939. Her parents divorced in 1945, and her mother committed suicide a year later. Despite her traumatic and tragic early life, Hesse was an accomplished student. As an adolescent, she already wanted to pursue art, and she attended the School of Industrial Art (now the High School of Art and Design). She went on to study at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn (from September 1952 to December 1953), Cooper Union (1954–57), and the School of Art and Architecture at Yale University (B.F.A., 1959), where she studied with artist Josef Albers. After she graduated, Hesse returned to New York City and supported her art by working as a pattern designer for a textile company. In 1961 Hesse exhibited her work for the first time in a show titled “Drawings: Three Young Americans” at the John Heller Gallery. She met and married sculptor Tom Doyle that year. Hesse’s first solo exhibition, a show of her drawings, was held in 1963 at the Allan Stone Gallery in New York City.
Eva Hesse, (born January 11, 1936, Hamburg, Germany—died May 29, 1970, New York, New York, U.S.), German-born American painter and sculptor known for using unusual materials such as rubber tubing, fibreglass, synthetic resins, cord, cloth, and wire. Hesse had a prolific yet short career, and her influence since her death at age 34 has been widespread.
Eva Hesse was a Jewish German-born American sculptor, known for her pioneering work in materials such as latex, fiberglass, and plastics.
Hesse graduated from New York’s School of Industrial Art at the age of 16, and in 1952 she enrolled in the Pratt Institute of Design. She dropped out only a year later. When Hesse was 18 years-old, she interned at Seventeen magazine. During this time she also took classes at the Art Students League. From 1954-57 she studied at Cooper Union and in 1959 she received her BA from Yale University. While at Yale, Hesse studied under Josef Albers and was heavily influenced by Abstract Expressionism.
One of the first to work with synthetic materials like fiberglass, latex, and plastic, Eva Hesse is best-known for her innovative sculptures, dubbed Postminimalist for the time and style in which they were made. Reacting to the rigidity and uniformity of Minimalism, Hesse’s sculptural forms appear soft, slack, and uneven, conveying a human sensibility. A pioneering feminist artist, Hesse desired, in her own words, to “challenge the norms of beauty and order.” Hesse’s painful childhood—having fled Nazi Germany followed by her mother’s suicide—significantly impacted her artmaking, prompting close friend and art historian Lucy Lippard to describe Hesse’s work as a “materialization of her anxieties.” Hesse’s artistic engagement with her own psychology is apparent in her Spectre paintings, where she uses muted tones and a thick and gestural application of paint to create haunting pictures reminiscent of Munch.
One of the first to work with synthetic materials like fiberglass, latex, and plastic, Eva Hesse is best-known for her innovative sculptures, dubbed Postminimalist for the time and style in which they were made. Reacting to the rigidity and uniformity of Minimalism, Hesse’s sculptural forms appear soft, slack, and uneven, conveying a human sensibility. A pioneering feminist artist, Hesse desired, in her own words, to “challenge the norms of beauty and order.” Hesse’s painful childhood—having fled Nazi Germany followed by her mother’s suicide—significantly impacted her artmaking, prompting close friend and art historian Lucy Lippard to describe Hesse’s work as a “materialization of her anxieties.” Hesse’s artistic engagement with her own psychology is apparent in her Spectre paintings, where she uses muted tones and a thick and gestural application of paint to create haunting pictures reminiscent of Munch.
References:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eva_Hesse
http://www.britannica.com/biography/Eva-Hesse
http://www.wikiart.org/en/eva-hesse
http://www.artsy.net/artist/eva-hesse
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/eva-hesse/10418/