Carl Andre

born 1935

In Tate Modern

Materials and Objects

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Artist biography

Carl Andre born 1935

American Minimal sculptor and poet. Born in Quincy, Massachusetts. In 1954 worked for Boston Gear Works and travelled to England and France. Served in the US Army 1955-6. In 1957 moved to New York and worked for a publisher. Wrote poetry and made drawings and some abstract sculptures in perspex and wood, with geometric forms. Influenced by Brancusi and by Stella, his close friend. 1960-4 worked as railroad freight brakesman and conductor on the Pennsylvania Railroad; made few sculptures, but these show move away from carving to works constructed out of simple blocks of material. His sculpture first exhibited in a group show in 1964, followed by his first one-man exhibition at the Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York, 1965; major retrospective exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum, New York, 1970. Made floor sculptures out of standard industrial units such as bricks or metal plates in simple arithmetic combinations; also experimented with scattered blocks and pieces of bent pipe, etc. Lives in New York.

Published in:
Ronald Alley, Catalogue of the Tate Gallery's Collection of Modern Art other than Works by British Artists, Tate Gallery and Sotheby Parke-Bernet, London 1981, p.9

Wikipedia entry

Carl Andre (September 16, 1935 – January 24, 2024) was an American minimalist artist recognized for his ordered linear and grid format sculptures. His sculptures range from large public artworks (such as Stone Field Sculpture, 1977, in Hartford, Connecticut, and Lament for the Children, 1976, in Long Island City, New York), to large interior works exhibited on the floor (such as 144 Magnesium Square, 1969), to small intimate works (such as Satier: Zinc on Steel, 1989, and 7 Alnico Pole, 2011).

In 1985 his third wife, contemporary artist Ana Mendieta, fell from their 34th-floor apartment window and died. Neighbors heard an argument and Mendieta shouting "no" immediately before the fall. He was acquitted of a second-degree murder charge in a 1988 bench trial, causing uproar among feminists in the art world; supporters of Mendieta have protested at his subsequent exhibitions.

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