{"product_id":"terminal-iron-works-the-sculpture-of-david-smith-9780262110365","title":"Terminal Iron Works: The Sculpture of David Smith","description":"\u003cp\u003eI dont touch  I touch with the eye David Smith  Rosalind Krauss believes that the body of work produced by David Smith over the past three decades constitutes the most important sculptural achievement of this century. This book characterizes his work in a way that will make the reader see it on the grounds of its own intense originality. Several arguments are developed simultaneously in the text: an historical description of Smiths career which shows how  from the beginning  his art departed from the conventional concepts and criticized the essential conservatism of modern sculpturewhether the welded work of Picasso and Gonzalez or the constructivism of Gabo or the surrealism of Giacometti; an explicit analysis of a few of Smiths greatest works indicating that his stylistic ambitions were consistent throughout his career; and an iconographic explanation of the nature of Smiths imagery (the cannon  the totem  the sacrifice) as he insistently repeated it. Documentary evidence garnered from the sculptors archive of sketchbooks and personal records supports this last argument.  Dr. Krauss tracks the content of Smiths style back through the labyrinth of his development and examines the formal alternatives he found to 20th century sculptureindicating that it was his ambition to completely restructure the relationship between the viewer and the single work of art. The books basic supposition is that  by a variety of means  David Smith made sculpture that would defeat the viewers attempt to possess it  either physically or intellectually; he created a sculptural language that arrogantly refuted possession  by touch or by theory of style. Indeed  the author asserts that a real understanding of Smiths sculpture will show that he did not  as his critics have said  predicate his work on a transformation of European art styles  or on characteristics of American abstract painting. His was a revolt from the historical community of ideas  from the concept of a volumetric core and a strict interpretation of media.  The book acknowledges the man behind his self-created myth of vulcan  the welder-hero  to see how and at what level Smiths formal convictions intersected private sources of feeling. It covers his work from the first private  highly subjective pieces which lacked an organizing spine  to the large public sculptures which were formalized in related series (the Tanktotems  Zigs  and huge stainless steel cubes  discs  cylinders and bar that made up the Cubis).  David Smiths work speaks for itself. Nearly 150 halftones complement Dr. Kreuss compelling text: photographs of Smiths sculpture taken by the artist  illustrations of works that influenced him  and drawings from the Smith Archive.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45279867568181,"sku":"ByrdShop_0262110369","price":87.65,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780262110365.jpg?v=1780614693","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/terminal-iron-works-the-sculpture-of-david-smith-9780262110365","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}