Robert Mangold

Born in 1930, in Huntingburg, Indiana, Robert Mangold received his arts education from Indiana University, where he earned a B.A. in 1959 and an M.F.A. in 1960. He has taught at Indiana University and Metropolitan State College in Denver, Colorado, where he currently resides.

Mangold’s primary artistic concern is the interrelationship of time and space as expressed through movement in sculpture. Equally fascinated by natural systems – ranging from the sub-atomic to the cosmic – and the dynamics of manmade constructions, the inspirations for Mangold’s compositions are exceptionally far-ranging.

Although his earliest constructions contained figurative references, Mangold began working in a kinetic vocabulary as early as 1958. This places him among the small number of artists that constitute the first generation of kinetic sculptors and links him to the kinetic-constructivist lineage informed by the ideas of Gabo and Moholy-Nagy. Developing his first wind-driven pieces at this time, he has continued to explore movement – both actual and implied – ever since.

Among his most renowned compositions, his wind-driven, stainless steel sculptures, which he labels Anemotives, juxtapose the consistency of repeated movement in a single direction with the unpredictability of its cause: the wind. Mangold has dedicated other works to examining space rather than motion. His I-Beam series witnessed him operating within a predetermined set of dimensions – those of steel I-beams –to create daring meditations on negative space.

Mangold’s most recent series, PTTSAAES, can be seen as the culmination of his diverse efforts to integrate investigations of both space and movement as embodied in sculptural form. Though deriving its title from an acronym for the phrase, “a Point Traveling Through Space At An Erratic Speed,” the series does not – in fact – include a single ‘point’ that lies within a tangible mobile element.

Rather, the ‘point’ and its ‘speed’ are purely implied. The first can only be defined as the ever roving focus of the viewer’s gaze; the latter is experienced as the perceived time it takes to transfer one’s visual attention from segment to segment of polished, or painted, piping that Mangold positions so as to form sharply angular joints. Although they impose a demand on the viewer’s attention, these works – like all his others – deliver considerable aesthetic and intellectual rewards in return.

Robert Mangold has exhibited internationally in more than 20 solo exhibitions, and his work has frequented important group shows throughout the world. He is the recipient of numerous awards including both the Colorado Artist of the Year and the AFKEY Award from the Denver Art Museum as well as the Henry Moore Grand Prize from the Hakone Open-Air Museum, Tokyo.