JAMES TURRELL: AUTONOMOUS SPACES

Through August 29th, 2009

GRIFFIN is pleased to present an exhibition of Autonomous Spaces models by James Turrell.

Internationally acclaimed artist James Turrell is known for his perception-altering light and space installations. Turrell’s art places viewers in a realm of pure experience. His large-scale, often architectural works incorporate the complex interplay of sky, light and atmosphere in motion across expanses of ocean, desert and city.  His light installations are often contained within Autonomous Spaces, unique architectural spaces designed for shaping the perception of light and space.  GRIFFIN will present several of the artist’s models for these structures -cast in smooth, undecorated plaster. The models and the spaces are just containers for the light. The art is in the experience of the viewer. 

The Autonomous Spaces evolved for the most part out of the Roden Crater project - Turrell’s magnum opus and one of the great American earthworks - located in the Painted Desert fifty miles northeast of Flagstaff, Arizona. Since 1972 Turrell has been transforming the Roden Crater into a large-scale artwork.  The antecedents of Roden Crater are the monuments of the ancient world, however, Turrell has taken full advantage of contemporary scientific knowledge of astronomy, physics and perception to create a structure that is truly of our time.  Comprised of several sky spaces tunneled into the crater, the Roden Crater serves as an observatory from which to view the sky and celestial events and is the culmination of his career-long exploration of light.

James Turrell was born in 1943 in Los Angeles.  Beginning with his first solo exhibitions at the Pasadena Art Museum in 1967 and the Stedelijk in 1976, his work has been the subject of over 140 solo exhibitions worldwide.  He has received numerous awards in the arts including The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and Guggenheim Fellowships.  He currently resides in Flagstaff, Arizona.