Phil Sims

Red Spectrum Paintings

A nine-part series of paintings for the rooms of the Kunstverein Grafschaft Bentheim.

May 12th - June 8th, 2001

June 24th:  Catalog show with Phil Sims and Rupert Walser, Munich.

Phil Sims' (born 1940, USA) work is located within the monochrome trend of the twentieth century, alongside pieces such as Malevich's "Black Square."  Sims' artwork is often described as being somewhere on a spectrum between the 'secretiveness' of an Ad Reinhardt and the 'cloudiness' of a Mark Rothko.
 
Designed specifically for the Kunstverein Grafschaft-Bentheim, "Red Spectrum Paintings" was an installation of nine works that varied in shade from crimson to violet, and was painted in his American studio.  The variously-sized paintings on canvas, each titled as "Untitled Red" and with the corresponding measure of the image format, are like a question-and-answer session with themselves.  They vary in color and size, and each interacts uniquely with the spatial layout and lighting of the room.  Sims' intention was to bring a new focus to the spectrum of a single color, the color red, while working in a fixed location.  This differs from his previous work at Kunstmuseum Bonn in 200, where his exhibition consisted of a room containing four large-scale works that he called the "Bonn Paintings."  They included "Bonn-Red," "Bonn-Blue," "Bonn-White," and "Bonn-Green."

A catalog published by the Kunstverein Grafschaft-Bentheim documents the artist's largest installation work.  Photos:  Achim Kukulis, Dusseldorf.

Sponsored by the city of Neuenhaus and the state of Lower Saxony.