Dorothea Rockburne: Minimalist to Abstraction

by J K Hudson
March 15, 1994

It is difficult to characterize Dorothea Rockburne's work by any one art movement, partially because it evolves rapidly. Her early work in the 70's is very austere and rigid as compared to her work of the late 80's, which indulges in rich color and sensuous brushstrokes. Her work is a hybrid of influences of Minimalism, Process art, Conceptual art, and Post-Painterly Abstraction.

In the early 1970's, Rockburne is labeled as a minimalist artist, but there are problems in labeling her as such. She does incorporate innovative materials and the larger format of the Minimalists as well as their pared down compositions sometimes based on mathematical relationships. However, the minimalist philosophy maintains the "art for art's sake" credo of Reinhardt's and the object-ness of art striped of content. Rockburne rejects the objecthood of her work by retaining the content as an important element and by making it out of non-permanent materials such as crude oil in Sign (1970), Disjunction/Or (1970) and Leveling (1970). Rockburne is only willing to concede that she is a "marginal minimalist."(1)

As a marginal minimalist Rockburne is just a step or two away from Conceptual Art, where the content (or idea) is more important than the object. She instead sets up a rigid construct of operations to incorporate her ideas into the work utilizing a mathematical language. This is clearly illustrated in her "Arena Series" (1978) and in her Drawing Which Makes Itself (1973).

In the Drawing Which Makes Itself, Rockburne folds and creases paper at a certain angle then draws a line where the edge meets the paper. She then folds along that line and draws another line, and so on and so on.(2) This operation would seem like Process Art and definitely has a process to it, but Rockburne denies that the operation of drawing is more important than the final result, that she does censor her own work and employs an "esthetic criteria."(3)

After ruling out what Rockburne's art isn't, it is easier to define what it is. She is an avid student of history, often inspired by Greek mathematical theories (Golden Section Paintings ), Italian Renassiance paintings ("Robe" series), Egyptian wall reliefs ("Egyptian" series), the bible ("Angels" series) and more. It's easy to see what she has been reading or where she has been at any given time just by looking at her work. Rockburne uses these historical interests as a point of departure in her metaphysical search for herself. In her own words: "I'm interested in the ways in which I can experience myself, and my work is really about making myself."(4)

Rockburne abandons the chance operations used by Abstract Expressionist and mantains rigid organization over her large to monumental pieces, always done in series. Early in her career, she explores unusual materials such as: crude oil, kraft paper and carbon paper, but by the 1980's she reverts to more traditional art mediums with oil paint and canvas. The next logical step in Rockburne's evolution from drawing to painting is the shaped canvas.

Rockburne utilizes shaped canvases to exploit her interest in geometric forms. Unlike Frank Stella, her canvases do not project in relief, but remain close to the wall. Rockburne plays with the canvas shape more as an optical illusion as in Narcissus (1984), where she takes two L-shaped canvases and attaches them so that one is horizontal and the other is set on the diagonal over the first. She then paints in the outline of the lower canvas on the upper canvas in a hard-edge line. This sets up a optical puzzle that requires more than a casual glance to determine which canvas is on top. With a return to paint and canvas , Rockburne approaches Post-Painterly Abstraction as she introduces luxurious color and brushwork into her non-objective paintings, while still maintaining her systematic processes. She applies her paint straight from the tube in thin veils of monochromatic color.(5)

Rockburne resists being locked into a specific category of art throughout her career. In her opinion, "I'm not a minimalist, I'm not a conceptualist, I'm not a shaped-canvas artist, I'm not a constructivist. I'm a painter who has never wanted to understand her work in a so-called logical way. Like love, it should remain undefined."(6) Dorothea Rockburne's art is laboriuously defined(whether we should or not) as almost Minimalism with aspects of process and conceptualism moving to Post-Painterly Abstraction. Where her art will go in the future remains to be seen.

Footnotes

1 Wheeler, Daniel, Art Since Mid-Century: 1945 to the Present. The Vendome Press, New York, 1991. p.209.
2 Goldberg, L., "Renewal of Possibilities", Arts Magazine, March 1973. Vol 47, p.33.
3 Licht, Jennifer, "An Interview with Dorothea Rockburne", Artforum, March 1972, Vol 10, p35.
4 Licht, Jennifer, p34.
5 Storr, Robert, "Painterly Operations", Art in America, February1986, Vol 74, p.87.
6 Gruen, John, "Artist's Dialogue: Dorothea Rockburne - A Beckoning Stillness", Archetecture Digest, February 1987, Vol 44, p.44.

Bibliography

Goldberg, L., "Renewal of Possibilities", Arts Magazine, March 1973. Vol 47, p.33.
Gruen, John, "Dorothea Rockburne's Unanswered Questions", Art News, March 1986, Vol 85, p.97-101.
Gruen, John, "Artist's Dialogue: Dorothea Rockburne - A Beckoning Stillness", Archetecture Digest, February 1987, Vol 44, p.44-7.
Koslow, Francine, "Dorothea Rockburne", Artforum, October 1989, Vol 28, p.178.
Licht, Jennifer, "An Interview with Dorothea Rockburne", Artforum, March 1972, Vol 10, p34-6.
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