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Contemporary Art

Writing, 1966

Mary Bauermeister; American

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Object Label

Mary Bauermeister’s first studio in Cologne, Germany, hosted her collaborations with avant-garde artists including American composer John Cage and Korean-American artist Nam June Paik. In 1962, Bauermeister moved to New York, drawn to its nascent assemblage and found object–based movements. Her “thought boxes,” like Writing, combine aspects of play and chance that relate to the Fluxus movement and subvert traditional viewer/artwork relationships. Using optical lenses, Bauermeister destabilizes the eye’s singular gaze. A flow and complexity of images, writing, and conceptual relationships emerge from her hand-drawn and handwritten ink formations. Puns and wordplay abound, alluding to her exploration of the English language.

Caption

Mary Bauermeister (American, born Germany, 1934–2023); American. Writing, 1966, 1966. Mixed media: acrylic, ink, plaster, glass on fiberboard, 33 1/2 x 33 3/4 x 6 in. (85.1 x 85.7 x 15.2 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Carll H. de Silver Fund, Caroline A.L. Pratt Fund and Ella C. Woodward Memorial Fund, 67.273. © Mary Bauermeister. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)

Gallery

Not on view

Title

Writing, 1966

Date

1966

Medium

Mixed media: acrylic, ink, plaster, glass on fiberboard

Classification

Sculpture

Dimensions

33 1/2 x 33 3/4 x 6 in. (85.1 x 85.7 x 15.2 cm)

Signatures

Verso: "112 / Writing / M. Bauermeiser / 1966 / Clean glass with acetone and cotton / never water or soap"

Credit Line

Carll H. de Silver Fund, Caroline A.L. Pratt Fund and Ella C. Woodward Memorial Fund

Accession Number

67.273

Rights

© Mary Bauermeister

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Frequent Art Questions

  • Writing by Mary Bauermeister is wild.

    Isn't it? I can stand in front of that one forever and always see something different!
    Absolutely. You'd never get the same perspective twice.
    Bauermeister said of her work, "I was so happy to have found the optical lenses, which, when put over the words in my lens boxes, would distort and change and make relative my statements. They were not meant as absolute truth, they were in-between results of a thinking and feeling process."
    There are so many different kinds of lenses here....she actually bought twenty boxes of lenses from an antique shop in the Netherlands in 1961, which had a bunch of lenses in all sizes and strengths, and used them in her work !
    Thank you. I've never seen something like that.
    Neither had I, until this exhibition!

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Artists and makers

Mary Bauermeister

3 works in the collection

American

1,739 works in the collection