Collection: Richard Artschwager

Richard Artschwager (1923–2013) was an American artist whose work occupied an unclassifiable position between sculpture, painting, furniture, and language. Trained as a cabinetmaker, he began making art in the early 1960s, producing objects that mimicked the appearance of functional furniture while refusing to function — tables that cannot be used, chairs that cannot be sat in, surfaces that simulate wood grain or upholstery through Formica and Celotex.

Artschwager was associated with both Minimalism and Pop Art without belonging fully to either. His work engaged with representation, domesticity, and the ambiguity of objects — asking what separates a sculpture from a piece of furniture, or an image from a surface. He also introduced the blp: a small, oval, hair-like mark that he placed in unexpected locations in galleries, cities, and publications as a kind of perceptual interruption.

His work has been exhibited at the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Kunsthalle Basel, the Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles, and the Sprengel Museum Hannover, among others. A major retrospective was presented at the Whitney Museum in 2012.

The New Rare holds printed matter and exhibition ephemera related to Richard Artschwager, including invitation cards, catalogues, and publications from exhibitions spanning his career.