Dan Flavin - “It is what it is and it ain't nothing else.”

Dan Flavin - Rhine-Elbe Science Park - 1996 - Gelsenkirchen, GermanyAmerican Minimalist artist Dan Flavin (1933-1996) won fame for creating objects and installations from commercially available fluorescent light fixtures. 

He emphatically denied that his sculptural light installations had any kind of transcendent, symbolic, or sublime dimension, stating: "It is what it is and it ain't nothing else.” Nevertheless, potential associations with the concept of light - from religious conversion to intellectual epiphanies - are discernible in Flavin's work, whether or not such interpretations were the artist’s intentions.

Flavin’s light "propositions," which he did not consider sculptures, are made up of standardized, commercially available materials, much like the readymades by Marcel Duchamp, which Flavin very much admired.

One of Flavin's last works was the lighting program featured here. The arcade was designed by Uwe Kiessler; it stretches 980 feet and connects nine buildings.

Many of the artist’s works are permanently installed at Dia - located at 23 Corwith Avenue in Bridgehampton, New York.