Peter Halley, Red Cell with Orange Background, 1985 | Paintings

* denotes required fields

In order to respond to your enquiry, we will process the personal data you have supplied to communicate with you in accordance with our Privacy Policy. You can unsubscribe or change your preferences at any time by clicking the link in our emails. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google: Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

This website uses cookies
This site uses cookies to help make it more useful to you. Please contact us to find out more about our Cookie Policy.

* denotes required fields

Signed, titled and dated on reverse
one panel
fluorescent acrylic and Roll-a-Tex on canvas

160.5 x 198.5 x 8 cm
63 1/4 x 78 1/8 x 3 1/8 in

The theoretical foundation of Halley’s works lies with the transformation of modernist geometric abstraction into ‘prisons’, ‘cells’, and ‘conduits’. This unique artistic vocabulary stems from his desire to connect modernist geometry to the realities of life in today’s megacities and the digital age. Red Cell with Orange Background represents one of Halley’s most elusive and subtle treatments of this theme. The central Roll-a-Tex fluorescent square and accompanying vertical bands are almost indistinguishable from the arrangement of form in a Newman or Malevich. Yet the use of Halley’s ersatz, artificial materials and lack of facture signify that the traditional vocabulary of transcendental geometric abstraction has been deployed with a radically different intent.

Peter Halley was born in New York in 1953. He studied first at Yale University and then at the University of New Orleans where he received his MFA. Also a respected art critic and theorist, Halley is revered for his essays on art and published his own magazine INDEX featuring interviews and profiles of other artists. His artwork can be found in collections worldwide including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, Broad Art Foundation, Los Angeles, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Dallas Museum of Art, Dallas, Tate Modern, London, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo, and the Seoul Museum of Art, Seoul, among many others.

Provenance

(Jay Gorney Modern Art, New York)

Collection of Lynn and Jeff Slutsky, New York

(Liz Koury, New York)

(Stuart Shave Modern Art, London)

MARUANI MERCIER Gallery, Brussels

Exhibitions

Post Modernism/Modernism: Robert Mangold and Peter Halley, MARUANI MERCIER Gallery, 2018, Brussels, Belgium
Peter Halley: Early Works, MARUANI MERCIER Gallery, March 22 – April 15, 2023, Brussels, Belgium

Literature

Cory Reynolds, ed., Peter Halley: Maintain Speed (New York: Distributed Art Publishers, 2000), 195, 196, 198, 200, ills.

(color).

Cara Jordan, Clément Dirié, ed., Peter Halley: Paintings of the 1980s, The Catalogue Raisonné, (Zurich: JRP | Ringier, 2019), 79, ill. (color).

Mangold Halley Modern Postmodern, exhibition catalogue, MARUANI MERCIER Gallery, Brussels, np., ill (color).

Peter Halley United States, b. 1953

Join our mailing list

Maruani Mercier

Privacy Policy

Contact

Cookie preferences

Join our mailing list

Peter Halley United States, b. 1953

Further images

Provenance

Exhibitions

Literature

Publications