Untitled (87-32 Bernstein)

Mathematical number sequences became one of the organizing principles that Donald Judd used early on—and continued throughout his career—as a method for creating art works. He pursued this strategy in an effort to break free from conventional methods of composition that had traditionally been employed by generations of artists preceding him. Judd strove to create works that had no prior formal or symbolic reference points in the history of art. At the outset of his career in the 1960s, he did so by choosing what were at the time thoroughly unconventional materials, such as aluminum, Plexiglas or stainless steel, alongside simple, pure geometric shapes, as the foundation for his work. He referred to sculptures such as the present work as “specific objects,” a unique category all their own, neither painting nor sculpture, but including aspects of both. These were works intended not to be displayed in the conventional way that traditional paintings or sculptures would be: hanging on walls or placed on floor pedestals. Through new forms and new methods of display, the artist sought to explore themes of scale, proportion, gravity and orientation in his art. Judd was one of the first artists to partner with specialized craftsmen to assist in fabricating art works for him, and in this he helped to pioneer an approach at first considered controversial but that has come to be an accepted practice in contemporary art, used by numerous artists from Andy Warhol to Jeff Koons.

Untitled (87-32 Bernstein) is part of the extended series of wall-mounted sculptural works—titled Progressions—whose forms derive from numerical sequences that the artist used as a way of developing sculptural shapes. The number sequences follow predictable, logical patterns well-known to mathematicians, and they helped Judd to generate compositional patterns for his sculptures. In breaking with compositional conventions, Judd was one of a number of artists of his generation who, beginning in the 1960s, sought new strategies and new materials for creating art works, and new environments, beyond museum and gallery walls, in which to show them.

In common with many of the works in the Progressions series, the present work consists of a rectangular upper portion which supports five boxes of varying widths that start small but rapidly increase in size. The use of two complementary colors helps to emphasize the patterns generated by the mathematical system. The spaces in between the boxes follow the same pattern as the boxes themselves, but running in the opposite direction, with the longest spaces next to the smallest boxes. The Progressions are designed to be viewed both from a frontal perspective and a crosswise perspective. This is in keeping with the artist’s belief that the Progressions should be viewed from all angles in order to fully understand both the works as a whole and their separate parts.

The name of the present lot, and of the series as a whole, refers to the progressively larger dimensions of the boxes, and of the spaces between them, arranged beneath the upper support element of the sculpture, as the boxes advance across the substantial length (approximately nine feet) of the work. The sculptures are actually the material embodiment of discrete sections of number patterns that, as abstract concepts, move progressively forward in protracted sequences, approaching infinity. Judd first began making the sculptures in this series in the mid-1960s, and continued to explore its possibilities throughout his career. Reflecting his interest in using industrial materials to fashion his sculptures, the present lot, executed in 1987, is made from colored anodized aluminum. Notwithstanding the highly abstract nature of the ideas underpinning this work, Judd was very much interested in making sculptures in the form of simple shapes that allow colors to project their presence as essential aspects of the works, creating a vivid experience for anyone viewing them.