In the last post on Richard Tuttle’s ceramic collaboration with Gemini G.E.L. in Los Angeles, I only dealt with the Tile series. He made two other ceramics with Gemini, Plant Growth (2012) and Blue In The Corner (2014). We did not illustrate these. The reason is that I wanted to learn more about this pot and sculpture. Knowing of his affection for Lucio Fontana (his 1960’s essay “A Love Letter to Lucio Fontana” remains one of the best pieces of writing regarding this artist), I asked if it has played a role in the sculpture. The oval and hole shapes are two of the Italian modernists’ primary elements. Tuttle replied:
“I am intrigued by your suggestion of Blue in the Corner, because of its speedy, leaning oval, and the perforations. Picasso’s distinction about borrowing and stealing comes to mind, here. But with Blue…, Fontana’s space is objectified, nullified: I can’t think of Fontana using blue, unless very light, in paper, or very dark… in the energetics of time, space movement, it’s good to be in the same place as Fontana. This place might develop a fusion which Fontana’s paintings and his ceramics could never do, or were planned, a statement, what could not be.”
The artist lives and works in Mount Desert, Maine; Abiquiú, New Mexico and New York City.
Garth Clark is the Chief Editor of CFile.
Above image: Plant Growth, glazed ceramic, © 2012, Richard Tuttle and Gemini G.E.L. LLC
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Blue In The Corner, © 2014, ceramic and wood, Richard Tuttle and Gemini G.E.L. LLC
Read our previous post on Richard Tuttle
Dear Mr. Clark,
In your post you mention Tuttle’s text “A Love Letter to Fontana”. The text was not written in the 60’s but in 1988. It featured in the Fontana catalogue for the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam and the Whitechapel Art Gallery in London.