Fred Sandback

Beginning in the late 1960s, Fred Sandback (1943–2003) developed a singular, minimal formal vocabulary that elaborated on the phenomenological experience of space and volume with unwavering consistency and ingenuity. He largely dispensed with mass and weight by using steel rod, elastic cord, and acrylic yarn to outline planes and volumes in space, creating an extensive body of works that inherently address their physical surroundings, the "pedestrian space," as he called it, of everyday life.

Sandback’s first solo shows were held at Galerie Konrad Fischer, Düsseldorf, and Galerie Heiner Friedrich, Munich, both in 1968, while the artist was still a graduate student pursuing his MFA at the Yale School of Art and Architecture. Other early exhibitions of Sandback’s work were presented at Dwan Gallery, New York (1969); Museum Haus Lange, Krefeld, Germany (1969); Kunsthalle Bern (1973); Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany (1974); Hessisches Landesmuseum, Darmstadt, Germany (1975); Kunsthaus Zürich (1985); Kestner Gesellschaft, Hannover, Germany (1987); and Westfälischer Kunstverein, Münster, Germany (1987).

Sandback became one of a small group of artists sponsored by Dia Art Foundation, which maintained an institution dedicated to his work—the Fred Sandback Museum—from 1981 until 1996. The museum was housed in a former bank building in Winchendon, Massachusetts, not far from the artist’s studio in Rindge, New Hampshire.

Sandback’s work was the subject of an extensive survey organized in 2005 by the Kunstmuseum Liechtenstein, Vaduz, which traveled to the Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, and the Neue Galerie am Joanneum, Graz, Austria, in 2006. In 2011, his work was featured in a solo exhibition at the Whitechapel Gallery, London. That same year, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver, dedicated its entire building to a solo exhibition of his work. In 2014, the Kunstmuseum Winterthur, Switzerland, hosted the first major retrospective of Sandback’s drawings, which was curated by Dieter Schwarz. This exhibition subsequently traveled to Germany to the Josef Albers Museum Quadrat Bottrop, Germany, and Museum Wiesbaden, Germany. In 2015, the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, St. Louis, Missouri, mounted an exhibition of Sandback’s work, and the major retrospective Fred Sandback: Light, Space, Facts was on view at Glenstone in Potomac, Maryland. In 2016, sculptures by the artist were installed in buildings designed by Luis Barragán: Casa Luis Barragán, Casa Antonio Gálvez, Cuadra San Cristóbal, and Casa Gilardi, all in Mexico City. In 2021, Fondation CAB in Brussels organized a solo exhibition of Sandback’s work, and in 2023, the Hamburger Bahnhof - Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart, Berlin, presented Fred Sandback: Simple Facts. An ongoing solo exhibition of the artist’s work dating from 1967 to 1983 has been on view at Mana Contemporary, Jersey City, New Jersey, since 2018. A long-term installation of Sandback’s work, first installed in 2003, reopened at Dia Beacon, New York, in 2021.

David Zwirner has represented the Estate of Fred Sandback since 2004. The gallery has presented seven solo exhibitions of the artist’s work, including a 2012 survey of important sculptures and drawings from each decade of his career in New York; a 2013 show at David Zwirner, London; and a 2016 presentation in New York entitled Fred Sandback: Vertical Constructions, which was accompanied by a catalogue published by David Zwirner Books with contributions by Yve-Alain Bois, David Gray, and Lisa Le Feuvre. The artist’s most recent solo presentation with the gallery took place at David Zwirner’s East 69th Street location in New York in 2022, and a two-artist presentation entitled L’Objet Invisible: Giacometti / Sandback was on view at the gallery’s Paris location in the same year.

Sandback’s work is represented in numerous public collections, including the Art Institute of Chicago; British Museum, London; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Fonds national d’art contemporain, Paris; Israel Museum, Jerusalem; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum für Moderne Kunst, Frankfurt; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC; Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; and the Yuz Museum, Shanghai.