image: Human Concretion
I have been a fan of Arp’s work for quite some time now and was very excited to see this exhibit since I had only seen a piece or two here and there over the years, and never a whole collection all in one place where you can really take the time to sit back and take it all in. Arp was a major contributor to the history of art by making purely abstract forms with little reference to anything in particular. His work is somewhere in between surrealism and dada with the element of chance used to make decisions in the actual art making. I found it interesting to compare his work with Henry Moore’s sculptures from about the same time period (starting roughly a hundred years ago). Moore’s work is modern and veers away from a realistic form mostly, but Arp is completely devoid of any reference to a figure’s nose or arms even if it makes you think of figures from time to time. There is a wonderful Moore sculpture directly outside at the Nasher, and a large one in front of City Hall, as well as the one at the DMA.
Arp’s work is elegant and I appreciate it, but I was quite disappointed with the show overall. Many of the sculptures were too close to the walls to feel comfortable walking all around them. As a viewer, this placement made it difficult to catch the wonderful changes you get from the work at every angle. The relief sculptures/paintings were also awkwardly hung, many up high on the wall and difficult to look at. Sight lines of the sculptures were always overlapping when you tried to catch an angle that the curator had not considered. I can’t remember a time when I was so annoyed with how a show was placed, especially at a museum. The second room of his works spilled over to the permanent collection to where I would argue the Nasher houses one of Rodin’s best works. It was like the mother-in-law upstaging the bride at her wedding. That Rodin, with so much impeccable detail, composition, and execution in the same room with these minimal Jean Arps made the Arps look a lot less significant than they should have for their own exhibit.
This Arp show is an important one and should be seen. I am always trying to temper people’s reactions to older work that may not seem as amazing as what is being made today by explaining that museums are usually showing work that was the first to do certain things, and it can be difficult to be impressed when newer work we see more regularly has taken steps far beyond what influenced it. I see Arp as groundbreaking in anticipating modern use of materials like plastics in industrial design, and stripping what art is down to the essentials, predating minimal art by decades. There are some incredible pieces in the show and it is worth seeing, my gripes aside.