19th March 2022
The first major exhibition by the pioneering pop artist comes to the UK's foremost sculpture park.
Robert Indiana: Sculpture 1958-2018, currently on at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park near Wakefield, traces the development of the American artist’s work across six decades.
Associated with the Pop Art movement, his iconic image ‘LOVE’ was first created in 1964 and is the showpiece of the exhibition. You might not have heard of the artist, but you’ve certainly seen the ‘LOVE’ image that has been ripped-off, recreated and reimagined many times over since Indiana gave it life.
The exhibition includes over fifty works spanning 60 years of the artists career, with many previously never shown int the UK. Many of Indiana's key themes: unity, acceptance, social justice - have never felt more relevant. Those who are only familiar with his huge one word installations would be well advised to check out Mississippi from the artist’s Confederacy series, Love Rising (The Black and White Love) created in response to the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Ash regarding the devastation the AIDS crisis caused.
Our personal pick is the huge six-foot-high aluminium sculptures ONE Through ZERO (The Ten Numbers) which address mortality and the universal experience. “Numbers fill my life,” he once said. “They fill, my life even more than love. We are immersed in numbers from the moment we’re born.”
Robert Indiana: Sculpture 1958-2018 runs till January 2023. ysp.org.uk
