The Mathematic Art of Dorothea Rockburne

Ella Nixon, ArtReview, January 16, 2025
The American artist’s works at Bernheim Gallery, London illustrate the potential freedom born from order.
 
Procedure and geometry characterise the work of American artist Dorothea Rockburne. Sometimes, the processes of creation are tangible on the surface, such as her experiments with chemicals to create the wrinkled finish of Tropical Tan (1967), a multipanelled steel screen that leans against the exhibition’s opening wall. At other times, process dictates how the works occupy space. For the installation Domain of the Variable (Y), (Z) (1972/2018/2024), rolled-up paper has been unfurled from the ceiling, left to curl and settle in a roll. But most often, process is contained within the telltale traces of production, as in the multiplanar and overlapping folded-vellum works of the late-1970s and early 80s.
 
Geometry infuses these folded works. One can imagine the nonagenarian Rockburne sitting down to make calculations and then transforming numbers into precise line using ruler and compass. This fusion of mathematics and art reflects her interdisciplinary training at Black Mountain College in North Carolina, where she studied during the early 1950s. There she was taught by the German mathematician Max Dehn (1878–1952), a figure who inspired Rockburne to discover maths in nature: organising principles, drawn from probability theory and set theory, underpin her abstract works.
 
These theories manifest as neither prescriptive nor limiting. The resultant works dance across the gallery spaces, illustrative of potential freedom born from order. Geometrical configurations on the second floor – such as Egyptian Painting: Sepa (1980) and Copal VIII (1979) – appear to float on the wall, as if caught by the wind. Monochromatic quadrilaterals and triangles unfold on ragboard and linen canvases. Their rhythmic elegance speaks to Rockburne’s Black Mountain encounter with dance, attending the classes of Merce Cunningham (1919–2009), and those of composer John Cage (1912–92), both pioneers of creative methods based on indeterminacy.
 

Rockburne translates this kinetic language and captures it in static form without losing the sense of unfolding movement. In Golden Section Painting: Rectangle/Square (1974), the rectangle is tilted, and the square is split diagonally into identical triangles: one white, one brown. Pencil lines and folds illuminate the overall organisational tension to suggest alternative, dormant shapes. Despite these potentials, the settled-upon rhythm feels correct, while mathematical harmony is underpinned by the Golden Section of the title.

 

Restrained tones contribute to this serenity, but as the exhibition progresses it becomes clear that structure is the overriding interest. Vibrant colours pop out of the wall, quite literally in the three-dimensional Les Pensées e Pascal (1987–88). Comprising a series of painted linen panels arranged vertically against an indigo wall, the work rises from the floor as a fiery orange jagged shape, above which rests a watery blue triangle set further back and overlapped by a tilted rectangle. Theatrical, arresting, it demands attention as part of the gallery architecture.

 

While the demarcated sections resonate with hard-edge abstraction of the 1960s, the various angles and transparent painterly effect also recall stained-glass windows. Interior Perspective, Discordant Harmony (1985) comprises painted slats of colour on layered canvases. Diagonal lines fill a square, overlapping a diamond panel to its right. Acidic green meets raspberry pink in this composed combination, overseen by a moody blue fragment that peeks overhead. Something deeper seeps from such structure: spiritual or scientific (or both)?

 

The fourth floor focuses on Rockburne’s more recent, astronomically inspired works. Brash colours resemble tie-dye conglomerations on white paper, occasionally embellished with silver paint, but here, as in the series of works Magellanic Magnification I–III (1994–98), her geometries appear within fields of pigment that suggest a more cosmic context. If Rockburne’s earlier works glow with their own inner orders, these later works seem to want to position them within the largest order of all.

 

The Light Shines in the Darkness and the Darkness Has Not Understood It at Bernheim, London, through 25 January.

 

Read the full review here.