U-M Museum of Art Presents Outdoor Sculpture by Legendary Artist Mark Di Suvero
Piece Sited Adjacent to Umma for 18 Months
The University of Michigan Museum of Art has unveiled a spectacular exterior sculpture by Mark di Suvero, one of the most acclaimed and successful artists in the world today. Generously loaned by the artist courtesy of Spacetime C.C. and the Hill Gallery in Birmingham, Mich., "Ave Delirio" (2001) is sited just north of UMMA in an area where the Museum's new $35 million addition will be built. The over 17-foot tall steel and stainless steel piece will be on view for approximately 18 months leading up to the groundbreaking of the Museum's expansion and renovation project.
Ave Delirio
Mark di Suvero
"Many collectors and curators, myself included, feel that Mark di Suvero is one of the two most important sculptors of the second half of the 20th century," said UMMA Director James Steward. "Mark shares this Museum's vision of engaging everyone, and particularly our students, in the world of the visual arts, and I'm honored that Mark has chosen to share his work with us so generously."
Di Suvero intends "Ave Delirio," like all his large-scale work, to be viewed from a variety of angles and positions, so the artist pays careful attention to composition, balance of forms, and capacity for movement. Pedestrians and ambient activity play an important role in experiencing the piece. As di Suvero said recently about "Ave Delirio": "It's the movement that's the thing. Commotion gives it life."
An American, Mark di Suvero was born in China in 1933 and raised in San Francisco. He graduated from UC Berkeley in 1956 with a bachelor's degree in philosophy. Often classified as an Abstract Expressionist sculptor, di Suvero has described his own work as "painting in three dimensions." His monumental sculptures are strongly influenced by his association with the world of machine shops, garages, and boatyards. Just as Abstract Expressionist painters explored the idea of gesture by using unconventional tools to shape the creation of a painting, di Suvero incorporates gesture in his sculpture through scale and the inspired use of industrial and found materials. These rugged materials contribute to a raw, unpretentious accessibility that often merges with the awe-inducing scale and technical audacity of the works—often, despite their scale, made by the artist alone in his New York studio.
Exhibitions of di Suvero's sculpture have been mounted in museums and galleries around the world since the 1960s and his work is represented in most of the world's leading collections of modern art, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Museum of Modern Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art. Outdoor exhibitions have taken place in Europe and the United States, including citywide installations in Paris, Venice, and New York. Cities in the United States with permanent installations of di Suvero's sculpture include Baltimore, Dallas, Grand Rapids, Houston, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, St. Louis, San Francisco, South Bend, and Toledo.
|
back to top