Hair Sculpture - Shallow Recess Box 1969

Editor: We're looking at Richard Artschwager's "Hair Sculpture - Shallow Recess Box," created in 1969 using mixed media. It resembles a container of some sort and has an interesting tactile quality because of the hairy texture. What do you make of it? Curator: It's a fascinating object, isn’t it? I find myself considering its relationship to the minimalist aesthetic so prevalent at the time, and how Artschwager both embraced and subtly critiqued it. It reduces form to this basic geometric shape. But why this material? Why this simulation of "hair"? It disrupts the clean, industrial feel typically associated with Minimalism. How does this juxtaposition speak to the socio-political landscape of the late 60s? Editor: That's an insightful question! So you think it is disrupting minimalism by almost making the sculpture 'organic'? Curator: Precisely. It introduces a sense of the uncanny, something familiar yet distinctly unnatural. Think about the associations with "hair" – its connection to the body, identity, and even notions of the grotesque. By putting this inside a minimalist form, is Artschwager suggesting something about what minimalist structure represses or leaves out? Is this structure holding the base components of identity and expression? It would be an intriguing interpretation. Editor: I never thought about "Hair" implying the grotesque... That changes everything! I was caught up in thinking of its geometry at first, but it’s a very loaded symbol that could be trying to fight that 'repressed' structure. Curator: And its function is ambiguous as well, is it not? We think 'container' but its impracticality as such brings a level of complexity. Museums are spaces with all sorts of cultural meaning as institutions that both hold objects and shape understanding. It makes one wonder what value this can or box holds...and how that value is both elevated and obscured by museum context. I learned a lot from this viewing; its social commentary potential gives me so much to ponder. Editor: Exactly! Thinking about its potential relationship with Minimalism really opened up a different dimension of consideration, and I agree with your point of a museum both adding to, and taking away, a work’s interpretation.