Eva Hesse: Oberlin Drawings: Drawings in the Collection of the Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College

"Oberlin Drawings offers a generous and indelible assortment of works on paper from a visionary woman, gone too soon." -Bookforum

A New York Times critics' pick | Best Art Books 2020

This monumental tome contains the entirety of the important German artist's drawings held in the collection of the Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin College, Ohio. The AMAM was the first museum to purchase a sculpture by Hesse, Laocoon, in 1970. In gratitude for its recognition of Hesse's work, and following the artist's untimely death, her sister Helen Hesse Charash generously donated the artist's notebooks, diaries, sketchbooks, photographs and letters to the museum.

Hesse's drawings played a crucial role in her work, which in turn gave way to an array of highly innovative techniques and styles that today still defy classification. As she commented in 1970: "I had a great deal of difficulty with painting but never with drawing ... the translation or transference to a large scale and in painting was always tedious.... So I started working in relief and with line." Hesse's custom of introducing sculptural materials into drawing and painting continues to influence artmaking today.

Eva Hesse (1936-70) was one of the foremost artists of the 20th century. Her work combined the seriality and reductionism of 1960s minimalism with emotion, sensuousness and physicality. Her work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, Tate, Guggenheim and many others.



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The book features reproductions of a sweeping variety of works on paper, from life studies and fiercely colorful goaches to collage pieces, abstract line drawings and diagrams of unrealized sculptures. -- Madeleine Taurins -- Ursula

Oberlin Drawings offers a generous and indelible assortment of works on paper from a visionary woman, gone too soon. -- Canada Choate -- Bookforum

When Eva Hesse died at 34 in 1970, she left behind an influential body of sculpture as well as a mass of drawings and works on paper whose extent is sumptuously revealed by this monumental volume. It reproduces more than 350 examples, almost all given to the museum over the years by the artist's sister, Helen Hesse Charash. Ranging from 1952 to 1970, they include art-school figure drawings, adaptations of older artists' styles and sketches for her canonical late works. Altogether, they indicate how Hesse achieved so much so quickly: She started young and never let up. -- Roberta Smith -- New York Times Read more Continue reading Read less