Artwork of the month March

Gordon Matta-Clark, Sauna Cut, 1971

Gordon Matta-Clark

* 1943 in New York City, † 1978 in New York City


 Sauna Cut, 1971


Fragment of a building: wood, glass, metall, insulating material
96,5 x 203 x 30,5 cm

KML 02.08

This is an early work by the prematurely deceased artist whose oeuvre has influenced the international art scene since the 1970s. Using a power saw, Matta-Clark cut a section out of a sauna that had been built in a New York loft, thereby practicing recycling long before the successful rise of the environmental movement.

On one hand, Matta-Clark demonstrates the simple clarity of modern architecture in small format; on the other hand, this seemingly arbitrary section, removed from the built-in com- ponent of an existing architectural structure, acquires autonomous sculptural shape. The shape oscillates between immobility and fragility, between transparency and its opposite, between linearity and its displacement, between the stability of the construction and the instability of the materials it is made of. Thus Sauna Cut raises questions regarding the sustainability of modernism's fundamental values, often still undermined in architectural practice today.

<b>Gordon Matta-Clark, Sauna Cut, 1971</b>
Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein highlights a work from the permanent collection each month throughout the year. Works from the collection of the Hilti Art Foundation are also included in this series on a regular basis.