He was 85 years old
American artist Richard Serra, an unavoidable figure in contemporary art and known for his monumental works made of rusty steel sheets, died on Tuesday at the age of 85, the New York Times reported.
Serra died at home in the state of New York, a victim of pneumonia, said the North American daily, which cited the artist’s lawyer.
Richard Serra produced massive, rounded works, but with a minimalist appearance, exploring space and the environment, which are exhibited all over the world, from the main North American museums to the Qatar desert.
Born in San Francisco, son of a Russian Jewish mother and a Spanish father, he trained in Paris before settling in New York, in the 1960s, where the artistic effervescence was at its peak.
At the end of the decade, he published a manifesto and then presented a seminal work, “One ton prop (House of cards)”, four 122×122 centimeter lead plates balanced by their own weight, like a house of cards.
He then moved on to large rusty orange-brown steel plates, displayed in New York, Washington, Bilbao and Paris.
In 2014, it even planted dark towers in the sand of Qatar, 70 kilometers from Doha.
“When you see my pieces, you don’t stay with an object. You stay with an experience, a passage”, stated Serra, in 2004.
