Independent New York

For the 2023 edition of Independent New York, Garth Greenan Gallery is pleased to present a selection of mixed media sculptures by Richard Van Buren. The exhibition will feature works in a range of Van Buren’s varied styles, including historical works that have been recently reconstructed by the artist after being lost in the 1970s.

Following his inclusion in the landmark exhibitions Primary Structures (1966, The Jewish Museum, New York) and A Romantic Minimalism (1967, Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia), Van Buren became strongly associated with the overarching Minimalism of the 1960s. Despite his prominent role in the exhibitions, he never fully submitted to the sleek surfaces and unrelenting formalism that was typical of the movement. Instead, his early works reveal a deep interest in the delicate interplay of light and color.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Van Buren largely shifted his focus from geometric floor works to wall sculptures—a transition he partially attributed to his wife, the dancer Batya Zamir. Zamir emphasized connection to space and architecture in her performances, which increasingly became a feature of Van Buren’s sculptures. In his recent recreation Dutch Walk (1970/2023), the artist casts strands of fiberglass along with dry pigments, graphite, and carpenter’s chalk into resin, forming masses that hang in an organic constellation on the wall. At the center of the puzzling objects, the fiberglass strands and pigments form a deep, impenetrable blue. At their edges, the sharp resin reflects light like naturally fractured gemstones.

Van Buren’s interest in color led to unfettered experiments in viscosity and opacity—exploring the complex ways that materiality and color intersect and blur. In Mt. Popo (1969/2023), electric green pigment is suspended in polyester resin. Light travels through the medium bouncing off the suspended fiberglass and pigment. The electric green bleeds into an impossibly thin layer—gesturing to the space around it—almost dematerializing. Despite the inorganic medium of polyester resin, the works often seem to be the result of some perplexing biological process.

The presentation offers a rare opportunity to reexamine the range of artistic work historicized under the Minimalist label.

Born in Syracuse, New York in 1937, Richard Van Buren studied painting and sculpture at San Francisco State University and the National University of Mexico. While still a student, Van Buren began exhibiting his work at San Francisco’s famed Dilexi Gallery, alongside artists as diverse as Franz Kline, H.C. Westermann, Ron Nagle, Ed Moses, and Robert Morris. In 1964, Van Buren relocated to New York. From 1967 to 1988, he taught in the Sculpture Department at the School of Visual Arts. In 1988, he began teaching at the Parsons School of Design. He remained at Parsons until September 2001. Van Buren lives and works in Perry, Maine.

During the 1960s and 1970s, Van Buren had solo exhibitions at many of the most influential and prestigious galleries, including: Bykert Gallery (1967, 1968, 1969, New York), 112 Greene Street (1972, New York), Paula Cooper Gallery (1972, 1975, 1977, New York), and Texas Gallery (1974, 1976, Houston). During this period, his work also figured prominently in many landmark museum exhibitions, A Plastic Presence (1970, Milwaukee Art Center), and Works for New Spaces (1971, Walker Art Center), among others. In 1977, the City University of New York Graduate Center mounted a retrospective exhibition of Van Buren’s work.

Van Buren’s work is featured in the collections of major museums around the world, including: the Art Institute of Chicago; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Museum of Modern Art; the National Gallery, Washington, D.C.; the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; the Smithsonian American Art Museum; the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; and the Walker Art Center.

Garth Greenan Gallery is pleased to represent Richard Van Buren.