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Dorothea Rockburne

Implicit Structure, 1979

Description

Maker

  • Dorothea Rockburne, b. 1921, Canadian

Title

Implicit Structure

Year

1979

Medium

Colored pencil and ink on paper

Materials/Techniques

Materials

  • ink

Supports

  • paper

Dimensions

76.2 x 57.1 cm (30 x 22 1/2 inches)

Signature / Inscription / Marks

Signed and dated LR.

Type

  • Works on Paper,
  • Drawings and Watercolors

Credit

Museum purchase with the aid of funds from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Mary B. Jackson Fund

Object Number

79.090

Exhibition History

Exhibition History

The Primacy of Paper

January 15 - June 20, 2010

Coming of age in the mid 1960s, many artists of Dorothea Rockburne’s generation were returning to fundamentals, including geometry and drawing. Rockburne’s art-making is based partly on topological geometry, behavioral and perceptual psychology, and classical models (such as the golden section). Her folded drawings suggest that structure and gesture are one and the same, and her materials yield the forms inherent to their own structure. The structure in this drawing develops seemingly logically, but as it opens out and extends itself, it teeters on the brink of chaos. Drawings such as this, made as a study for a painting in her Egyptian Paintings series, use geometry to simultaneously suggest, and deny, order.

The Nancy Sayles Day Collection

January 4 - February 6, 1977

Use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in Copyright. This object is Implicit Structure with the accession number of 79.090. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

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