Series and Progressions

This monograph is published on the occasion of Dan Flavin: Series and Progressions, the first exhibition of the artist’s work at David Zwirner since the gallery announced its representation of the Estate of Dan Flavin. This publication will examine Flavin’s use of progressions and serial structures, ideas that were central to the artist’s practice throughout his career. Flavin has been credited (by Mel Bochner) with being “one of the first artists to make use of a basically progressional procedure”, and the systematic arrangement of colour and light was an aspect of his work that not only led to it being characterized as Minimal art but which moreover influenced Conceptual artistic practices. The catalogue will feature a selection of exemplary work by the artist, ranging in date from 1963 to 1990.
The first major monograph on Flavin’s work since the 2004 exhibition catalogue published on the occasion of the artist’s travelling retrospective (organized in 2004 by the Dia Art Foundation in association with the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., and the Estate of Dan Flavin), Dan Flavin: Series and Progressions will include over 50 full-colour plates, in addition to a comprehensive selection of installation views and archival photographs and documents. Also included will be newly-commissioned texts on the artist’s work by noted Flavin scholar Tiffany Bell (who authored the artist’s catalogue raisonné), and by art historians Anne Rorimer and Richard Shiff, and an interview with Dan Graham. Additionally, a detailed illustrated chronology will document exhibitions of Flavin’s work, covering the years 2004-2010.