The language
was
of art
produced a print
was
publisher in Asheville that
troublesome. Albers
Bauhaus
the
Asheville prints were
arrived in
America
very similar to one (see
power of
pure, undiluted color.
When
closed.
shown
19^4, Kandinsky wrote
in
in Berlin
the Berlin and
sheets clear
.
.
.
and forms, than
tures
They seem
and improvisational, with
their
the preceding works, but like
abstract, nonreferential shapes-that are kernels of
finally a perfect
technique."
24
effective
The work
new work reveals nothing of the uncertain-
energy. This
of the
ties
artist's life;
rather
it
makes paint and panel
a source of high spirits. In spite of the appearance of
randomness
in these paintings, their positive
embodies points that had become central to Albers's
always the
teaching and which he articulated
abstraction of ca. 1940 painted on an
Bauhaus
element must yield at
Wings
(cat.
in
1928.
least
one
sum
over and above the
in a lecture
pub-
'An element plus an
interesting relationship
Thus
of those elements. "
no. 109), there are not only the
left-
terplay between the two.
game
of opposites.
negative of the one
on the
stripes
left
Is
in
and
right-hand configurations, but also the constant
in a
in-
The viewer becomes engaged the rectangle
on the
more
the preface to the catalogue
reflect all Albers's qualities: artistic invention,
lished at the
far
rougher tex-
the earlier pieces they present solid areas of pigment— in
and convincing composition, simple but
means: and
carefree
years after he
first
(see cat. nos. 112- 117) revel in the
end of
in Italy at the very
accompanied the exhibition, "These beautiful
that
paintings Albers executed during the
in) with a
106-108) he had been working on
cat. nos.
when
less
series (see cat. nos. 109-
Why
left?
on the
right the
do the horizontal
appear to be white on black and
What
those on the right black on white?
the nature
is
top
result of
mood
RCA
Victrola
no. 115) demonstrates the precise approach
(cat.
that characterizes even Albers's seemingly offhand
work. Like the forms
in so
many of Albers's
two-figure
paintings of the thirties and forties (see cat. nos. 126-
two
128, 134, 140), the
cloud-like central bodies have
been conceived with great care. Their colors accentuate their personalities.
The jaunty pink
rangey one; the green,
somehow
perfect for the stockier,
a
suits the tall
more
settled hue,
sum
which resembles the
exceed two; the tense void between the two forms
one another
to these prints as are relationships of color in the
Homages on
to the Square. "Frugality leads to
lightness.... In
any form, nothing should be
unused, " Albers also wrote
in that
economical Showcase
no.
see are
and
emphasis
(cat.
1
two rectangles-one with
a third configuration in
1
1928 essay. 1
its
)
left
In the
essentially all
we
corners flattened—
which
a single line
is
contorted to create two interlocked beings that appear to lean into
one another. There
physical or emotional. elevate the it
down
We
The
is
no gravity
here, either
larger rectangle appears to
whole configuration, the second one
to hold
so that everything does not float heavenward.
read the composition as chambers within cham-
bers, as
.1
stage, as
comedy.
A
few thin
lines, carefully
positioned, provide endless entertainment.
Like his earlier glass pieces and the later Homages, the
>-
is
relationship of these bodies elucidates Albers's point that the
forces exerted against
and
more compact shape. The
of the strange attraction between the two bodies,
by two magnets? Relationships of forms are as essential
is
conscious decisions. The untitled
of one plus one in art can, in fact must, is
as
interesting as the forms themselves.
Albers
was
1949. In a
he had
at
Black Mountain College from 1933 to
world
come
tranquility.
in
to a
which oppression was spreading, haven for freedom and
relative
This was his typical move. In a hierarchical,
class-conscious
Germany he had found
his
way
to the
Bauhaus, an island of intellectual and social experimentation.
Now, with
totalitarianism overcoming
homeland, he had arrived
his
free
from most of the
in a
pocket of America
restrictions of conventional
middle-class society. Albers's freedom did not just
from physical
above he
all
easily,
place,
derived from his
and with
total
however;
own
his
come
independence
character. In the 1950s
awareness of what he was
doing, distanced himself from the multiple pressures of
academia his
own
at Yale
and of the
New York
art
world
to
go
route. Luck, along with an intense determina-