Magnesium Square by Carl Andre

Many of the new media and the new genres developed in the later period of twentieth century were Theresa Ann Gill History of Performance

equally dependent on the notion that it was the idea that lay behind a work of art that counted, rather than the traditional notions of craftsmanship or the importance of a work being produced by the hand of the artist who had signed it. Minimalist sculptors such as Donald Judd, Carl Andre and Robert Morris, often used pre-made objects such as bricks or metal sheets in their works. They also tried to give their sculptures the look and feel of mass-produced, machine-tooled products-an effect heightened by their tendency to repeat forms and compositional units in their compositions.

Andre too has always been a performer without stage or curtain. He bows for admiration, while he subverts the distinction between actor and audience. He restructures the world, while he refuses a privileged place within it (Sandler, 16-18).

From the first drawings scrawled on cave walls like graffiti, art has shouted, pleaded, seduced, and cajoled: "Look at me." Often it served kings and churches. Increasingly it had to please new wealth—or the artist alone. Either way

Andre's work has been typified by the use of natural or simple commercially available materials, such as bricks, metal plates or concrete blocks, stacked or arranged side by side in simple patterns. One of his first distinctive works is Cedar Piece, which consists pieces of wood stacked on top of one another in a tall column. Andre cited the wooden sculptures of Constantin Brancusi as an influence in this and similar works.

Since the earliest time in his career, Andre has also produced concrete poetry. Many have seen the arrangement of words on the page in these poems as reflecting the arrangement of units on the floor in his sculptures. The creative search for nuance and control remained, but it came with a steep price. It put the artist's obsessions on a par with the viewer's. Rather than a solitary genius, the artist was co-producer of a public commodity. Once at least, the price included the artist's life (Serota, 34).

No metal can be cut, filed, drilled or shaped as easily or as quickly as magnesium. This also reduces the cost of the finished product. Magnesium also lends itself easily to welding and riveting. The strength of cast and wrought magnesium alloys in relation to their weight can be very high indeed, cast alloys showing strengths of 300 Newton’s per mm2 and wrought alloys up to 380 Newton’s. The strength to weight ratio of such material resembles that of high tensile steel (Sandler, 16-18).

Memory is always an idealization—even memories of the tangible and literal. My admiration of Andre's early production collided head-on with his newest show, and something had to give. In Minimalism's first years, art began to breathe. Had its breath finally become short? Andre once played with the very

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Germany Sandler, Robert Morris, Carl Andre, Alloy Square, Brancusi Andre, Copper Square, Constantin Brancusi, History Performance, Cedar Piece, Andre Serota, sandler 16-18, magnesium alloys, serota 34, carl andre, metal plates, bricks metal, infinite column, sometimes using,