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Alan Saret

Alan Saret’s (b. 1944, New York) practice includes sculpture, drawing, painting, architecture, geometry study, writing, language study, music, furniture-making, and growing food and flowers. He is best known for the flexible sculptures, composed of wire, rubber, and other industrial materials, that he has created since 1967. After a three-year sojourn in India in early 1970s, Saret returned to making art and became deeply invested in the exploration of numerical and geometric conceptions of space. While his work was initially labeled “anti-form” to distinguish it from hard-edged Minimalism, Saret stresses its organic and illusionistic qualities, describing his process as “ensoulment.” Alongside his sculptures, he also composes works on paper that involve spontaneous mark-making, geometric configurations, and mystical symbolism. Saret lives in Brooklyn.

Alan Saret’s work can be found in collections including the Art Institute of Chicago; Brooklyn Museum, New York; Dallas Art Museum; Detroit Institute of Art; Fogg Museum, Cambridge, Massachusetts; Hammer Museum, Los Angeles; High Museum of Art, Atlanta; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, St. Louis; Minneapolis Institute of Art; MoMA PS1, New York; Morgan Library & Museum, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Museum of Modern Art, New York; National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton, New Jersey; Saint Louis Art Museum; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

Single work, Alan Saret

Born 1944, New York, New York
Lives and works in Brooklyn, New York

EDUCATION

1967

Postgraduate study, Fine Arts, Hunter College, New York

1966

BA, Architecture, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York

 

SELECTED SOLO AND TWO-PERSON EXHIBITIONS

2024

Karma, New York, The Rest of Me

2022

Karma, New York, Allies

2007

The Drawing Center, New York, Alan Saret: Gang Drawings

2004

James Cohan Gallery, New York, Hiraki Sawa and Alan Saret

2001

James Cohan Gallery, New York, Carl Andre and Alan Saret

1990

MoMA PS1, New York, Alan Saret: Retrospective

1989

Lorence-Monk Gallery, New York, Alan Saret: Angle & Axis

Daniel Weinberg Gallery, Los Angeles, Sol LeWitt and Alan Saret: Recent Drawings

1987

Christine Burgin Gallery, New York

1984

University of California, Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, John Chamberlain and Alan Saret: Arithmetic/Harmonic

1983

Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo

Hallwalls, Buffalo

1982

Newport Harbor Art Museum, Newport Beach, Matter into Aether

Charles Cowles Gallery, New York

1981

University of Rhode Island, Kingston

Galerie Rudolf Zwirner, Cologne, Alan Saret: Skulpturen und Zeichnungen

1980

Charles Cowles Gallery, New York

1979

Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, Matrix 18

Hayden Gallery, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge

Daniel Weinberg Gallery, San Francisco, Sculpture and Drawings

University of California, Berkeley, Permutation Cluster Galaxy

1978

University of California, Irvine, Irvine, Visionary Drawings, Energy Fields, Sculpture

University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley

1977

Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Mesh Work Architecture and Dragon’s Tooth Casting

SITE, San Francisco

1976

MoMA PS1, New York

1975

597 West Broadway, New York

1974

The Clocktower, New York, Alan Saret: Drawings and Sculpture

54 Leonard St., New York

MoMA PS1, New York, Alan Saret: Drawings and Sculpture

Rosa Esman, New York

1971

Katonah Gallery, Katonah, New York

1970

Bykert Gallery, New York

Spring Palace, New York

Bennington College, Bennington, Vermont, Alan Saret: Watercolor Drawings

1968

Bykert Gallery, New York, Mountains of Chance, Documents of Ruralism . . . Changing Manufactures

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2024

Gallerie Nazionali di Arte Antica in collaboration with Aïshti Foundation, Palazzo Barberini, Rome, Day for Night: New American Realism, curated by Massimiliano Gioni and Flaminia Gennari Santori

Menil Drawing Institute, Houston, Out of Thin Air: Emerging Forms, curated by Kirsten Marples

2023

Museo Jumex, Mexico City, Colección Jumex: Everything Gets Lighter

The Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville, Florida, A Walk on the Wild Side

The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Long Story Short

The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Collection 1940s–1970s: Touching the Void

Griffin Art Projects, North Vancouver, Canada, Per Diem Part II

2022

Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, Joan Didion: What She Means

The Church, Sag Harbor, Threading the Needle

Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithica, From the Collection: Three Alumni Artists

Le Centre Pompidou, Paris, France, Worlds of Networks

2020

Marc Selwyn Fine Art, Beverly Hills, Drawing Connections

2019

ZMK | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe, Germany, Negative Space

Matthew Marks Gallery, New York, One Hundred Drawings

2018

University of South Florida Contemporary Art Museum, Tampa, Restricted

David Nolan Gallery, New York, Drawing Space: 1970-1983–Darboven, Le Va, Rockburne, Sandback, Saret, Sonnier

2017

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Thinking Machines: Art and Design in the Computer Age, 1959–1989

James Cohan Gallery, New York, Sculpture: Works by Nahum Tevet, Richard Long, Alan Saret

Jean-Paul Najar Foundation for Contemporary Art, Dubai, Artist Run New York: the Seventies

2016

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Collected by Thea Westreich Wagner and Ethan Wagner

MoMA PS1, New York, FORTY

2015

David Zwirner, New York, Selections from The Kramarsky Collection

Museo Jumex, Mexico City, Colección Jumex, In Girum Imus Nocte et Consumimur Igni

2014

Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca

Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, Color Shift

2013

Fondazione Prada, Venice, When Attitudes Become Form: Bern 1969/Venice 2013, curated by Germano Celant

Daniel Weinberg Gallery, Los Angeles, Ambach & Rice Presents: 40 Years at the Daniel Weinberg Gallery

2012

Inman Gallery, Houston, Paper Space: Drawings by Sculptors

Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, Intimate Intensity: The Susan and Larry Marx Collection

Museum Wiesbaden, Wiesbaden, Germany, Der Raum der Linie

2011

Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, DER RAUM DER LINIE

David Zwirner Gallery, New York, 112 Greene Street: The Early Years (1970-1974)

2010

Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, Selections from the Hammer Contemporary Collection

Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca, James Siena: From the Studio

Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Re-Seeing the Contemporary

2009

James Cohan Gallery, New York, Shaping Space

Texas Gallery, Houston, SuspectTraces: A Summer Group Show

2007

James Cohan Gallery, New York, The Summer Show

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Uncontained

COOK FINE ART, New York, AROUND 1984

2006

Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, A Measure of Time: American Art 1900 to the Present

2003

James Cohan Gallery, New York, NY, A Simple Plan

2002

David Nolan Gallery, New York, 5 Sculptors: Drawings from the 1970’s–Richard Artschwager, Barry Le Va, Sol LeWitt, Alan Saret, and Richard Tuttle

2001

Curt Marcus Gallery, New York, Bruce Conner, Agnes Denes, Alan Saret: Early Drawings

2000

Museum of Modern Art, New York, MoMA2000: Making Choices

Queens Museum of Art, New York, Art at Work: Forty Years of the Chase Manhattan Collection

Contemporary Arts Museum Houston, Houston, Afterimage: Drawing Through Process

1999

Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Afterimage: Drawing Through Process

1997

The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA, Los Angeles, A Lasting Legacy: Selections from the Lannan Foundation Gift

MoMA PS1, New York, Reopening: Installations and Projects

1995

Museum of Modern Art, New York, American Sculptors in the 1960s: Selected Drawings from the Collection

1994

National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., From Minimal to Conceptual Art: Works from The Dorothy and Herbert Vogel Collection

1993

Brooklyn Museum, New York, The Second Dimension: Twentieth-Century Sculptors’ Drawings from The Brooklyn Museum

1991

MoMA PS1, New York, Out of Site

Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Between Geometry and Gesture: American Sculpture 1965-1975

Daniel Weinberg Gallery, Santa Monica, The Margins of Minimalism

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Immaterial objects: works from the permanent collection of the Whitney Museum

1990

University Gallery, University of Massachusetts, A Collection of Original Works by Seven Young Artists

Christine Burgin Gallery, New York, NY, John Cage, Alan Saret, Richard Tuttle

1989

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, The experience of landscape : three decades of sculpture

1988

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Organic Abstraction

Blum Helman Gallery, Santa Monica, Questioning the Givens

University Gallery, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, 24 Cubes

1987

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Whitney Biennial 1987

IBM Gallery, New York, New York Computer and Art

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Contemporary Works from the Collection

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Drawing since 1940

1986

MoMA PS1, New York, Images of the Unknown

MIT Gallery & Bank of Boston, Boston, Natural Forms and Forces

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Sculptors’ Drawings

Harm Bouckaert Gallery, New York, Richard Artschwager, Alan Saret, and Pat Steir

Brooklyn Museum, New York, National Print Exhibition, 24th Biennial: Public and Private: American Prints Today

1985

Brooklyn Museum, New York, Contemporary American Prints: Recent Acquisitions

Brooklyn Museum, New York, Working in Brooklyn: Sculpture

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Made in India

1982

Nationalgalerie, West Berlin, Kunst Wird Material

Harm Bouckaert Gallery, New York, Drawing Invitational 1981

1981

Whitney Museum of Art, New York, Developments in Recent Sculpture

William Paterson College Gallery, Wayne, New Jersey, 112 Greene Street Revival

1980

MoMA PS1, New York, Watercolors

MoMA PS1, New York, Sculpture at the Coliseum

39th Venice Biennale, Venice, Drawings: The Pluralist Decade

Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Drawing/Structures

Aspen Center for the Visual Arts, Colorado, Beyond Object

Max Hutchinson Gallery, New York, 10 Abstract Sculptures, American and European, 1940-1980

Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Architectural Sculpture

Wave Hill, Bronx, Temporal Structures

1979

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Contemporary Sculpture: Selections from the Collection of The Museum of Modern Art

Artists Space, New York, Artists Draw

1977

University of Georgia Museum of Art, Athens, Open to New Ideas

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Whitney Biennial 1977

MoMA PS1, New York, New York Avant-Garde/Works and Projects of the Seventies

MoMA PS1, New York, Open Studios

Museum of Modern Art, New York, American Drawn and Matched

Institute d’Art Contemporain de Montreal and National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, 03 23 03

Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, A View of a Decade, 1967-1977

1976

MoMA PS1, New York, Rooms

MoMA PS1 and Artforum, New York, The Magazine Show

Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, American Art of the 20th Century

Akademie der Künste, Berlin, Soho Downtown Manhattan

1975

MoMA PS1, New York, Collectors of the Seventies, Part I: Dorothy and Herbert Vogel

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Materials and Manipulations

1974

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Works on Paper

1973

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, American Drawings, 1963-73

1971

Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, 6 Sculptors: Extended Structures

Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi, India

1970

Sidney Janis Gallery, New York

Museum of Modern Art, New York, Paperworks

1969

Kunsthalle, Bern, Switzerland, Live in Your Head: When Attitudes Become Form

Steinberg Gallery, St. Louis, Here and Now

1968

Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, 3 Young Americans: Krueger, Nauman, Saret

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, 1968 Annual Exhibition: Contemporary American Sculpture

Castelli Gallery, New York, Nine in a Warehouse

Bykert Gallery, New York

 

SELECTED PUBLIC PROJECTS AND INSTALLATIONS

1992

Pittsburgh International Airport Arrival Terminal, Pittsburgh

1985

Brooklyn Museum, New York, Proposals for Metro: Downtown Seattle Transit Project

1975

Artpark, Lewiston, New York, Ghosthouse

1974

Second Indian Triennale, New Delhi, The India Ramp

 

PUBLIC COLLECTIONS

Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover, Massachusetts
Albright–Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York
Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College, Oberlin
Art Institute of Chicago
Blanton Museum of Art, Austin
Brooklyn Museum, New York City
Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine
Dallas Art Museum, Dallas
Davidson College, Davidson, North Carolina
Denver Museum of Art, Denver
Detroit Institute of Art, Detroit
Fondation Cartier, Paris
Glenstone, Travilah, Maryland
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
Harvard Art Museum, Cambridge
Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca
High Museum, Atlanta
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City
Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, St. Louis
Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis
Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, Fort Worth
MoMA PS1, New York City
Morgan Library & Museum, New York City

Museo Jumex, Mexico City
Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Chicago
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Museum of Modern Art, New York City
National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C.
Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City
Princeton University Art Museum, Princeton
Saint Louis Art Museum, St. Louis
Syracuse Art Museum, Syracuse
University Museum at Southern Illinois University, Carbondale
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City

 

AWARDS

1979

Visiting artist in sculpture, University of California at Irvine, Irvine, CA, residency

1976

Creative Artists Program Service Grant, New York

1975

National Endowment for the Arts Grant

1969

Guggenheim Fellowship for Creative Arts, US & Canada

 

PUBLICATIONS

2024

See & Be
Karma, New York, 2024
248 pages
11 × 8 12 inches

2022

Alphabetaka
Karma, New York, 2022
52 pages
11 × 8 12 inches

 

Matter Into Aether
Text by Klaus Kertess
Karma, New York, 2022
108 pages
12 × 6 14 inches

1999

Afterimage: Drawing Through Process

Essays by Pamela M. Lee, Cornelia H. Butler

MOCA & MIT Press, Cambridge

152 pages, softcover

9.6 x 0.6 x 12 inches

1985

Gerard McCarthy

Abstract forms: the sculptures of Alan Saret and John Duff

Syracuse University, Syracuse

79 pages, softcover

1982

Alan Saret: Matter into Aether

Newport Harbor Art Museum, Santa Ana

108 pages, softcover

1979

Artists Draw: Donald Sultan, Tom Martin, Auste Peciura, Alan Saret, Patti Smith, Nancy Spero

Artists Space New York, New York

18 pages, softcover

8.9 x 13.9 cm

1978

Donald John Evans

The Problem of Environment in the Work of Alan Saret

University of Texas at San Antonio

78 pages, softcover

 

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