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As a child, Richard Serra could watch the ships in San Francisco Bay from his window – and the fascination with water and large steel structures never left him.
With several enormous steel sculptures, Serra became one of the most important and successful sculptors in the world. But it was also always controversial. The artist repeatedly emphasized that the popularity of his work meant nothing to him. “I don’t believe the job of art is to please.”
He died of pneumonia
Serra died Tuesday in upstate New York at the age of 85, his attorney John Silberman confirmed. According to consistent media reports, he died due to pneumonia.
Most of Serra’s works, often based on models made in Germany, are large and weigh several tons. He has created sculptures for more than 100 public places, from Philadelphia and St. Louis to São Paulo to Bochum and Kassel. However, amid a dispute, he withdrew his design for the Holocaust memorial in Berlin. The basic idea with a sea of stelae came from him. But when his design was changed, Serra withdrew it “for personal and artistic reasons.” Another sculpture in New York was dismantled after strong protests. Serra was as ‘steely and uncompromising as his works’, the British ‘Guardian’ once wrote.
“Monumental works”
New York’s renowned Guggenheim Museum honored Serra’s work, saying Tuesday that his “monumental works have changed our perception of space and form.”
Serra has recently lived and worked in New York, Long Island and Nova Scotia, Canada. He was born on November 2, 1938 in San Francisco. His father worked in a shipyard for several years, where his son’s love for steel structures, already sparked by watching ships through his childhood bedroom window, was further fueled. “It was a lively environment,” the artist once recalled. “I grew up poor, but the atmosphere was rich.”
His sculptures became increasingly larger
Serra studied English literature at the University of California, Santa Barbara and the elite Yale University. He then went to New York, where he met other artists such as Donald Judd, Dan Flavin and Jasper Johns and soon began experimenting with lead and steel. Serra’s sculptures became larger and heavier and eventually the steel began to have curves.
To great effect, as Serra later said: “People responded to the curves in a way they had never responded to angles and straight lines before. They had never seen that before. People were ready for the turns.” As a result, more and more galleries and renowned museums cleared enormous spaces for Serra.
The artist also painted occasionally, but mainly remained monochrome. “I’m working on a pink painting,” Serra once told the New York Times. ‘It’s in my closet. Or green and purple. I also thought about a light yellow-green for a week.” Was he serious? You never really knew that with Serra. (SDA)
Source: Blick
I am Amelia James, a passionate journalist with a deep-rooted interest in current affairs. I have more than five years of experience in the media industry, working both as an author and editor for 24 Instant News. My main focus lies in international news, particularly regional conflicts and political issues around the world.
