| Blue Blood is one of a handful of loops the artist constructed in the years after a fire destroyed his apartment, studio, and much of his early work. Puryear’s loops are evidence of his fascination with line, mass, and space. He has described them as being primarily about line, essentially drawings in wood. From a distance, Blue Blood seems to be drawn directly onto the wall, possessing volume only as you move near it. Thus it reads as both line and object, a form without a center. It is not a perfect ring, but a graceful arc loosely based on the elemental shape of a circle. It is stained black, only a tiny rectangular carving on one side of the interior revealing that it is made of red cedar. The shape atop it, painted yellow, is constructed of pine.
The Corcoran acquired Blue Blood shortly after it organized the artist’s first solo museum show, in 1977. . . .
:: Stacey Schmidt, Associate Curator of Contemporary Art
Corcoran Gallery of Art |
Text excerpted from A Capital Collection: Masterworks from
the Corcoran Gallery of Art.
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