Untitled

1965

Fiberglass, polyester resin

182.9 x 10.2 x 7.6 cm (72 x 4 x 3 in.)

A long, narrow object that seems organic is standing erect, tall as a human being. It is not easy to identify its nature and function: is it a liana? A club? A giant cucumber? This ambiguous and deceptively simplistic artwork raises the question of its own qualification.

Untitled is one of Bruce Nauman's first artworks in fiberglass and resin, two materials that were not used in sculpture before. Cast in a plaster mold made after a clay shape, the artwork plays on its own asperities and on the transparency effects of the material in which it is made. The artist enjoys the fabrication process of fiberglass sculptures because “you don't know what they will look like once finished.” Altogether simple and undetermined, transparent and opaque, Untitled is experimental in nature.

This artwork was shown for the first time in 2006 at the Where Are We Going? exhibition at Palazzo Grassi, in Venice.
Exhibitions