In Electrical Wrap (2020–21) by Lynda Benglis, the rhythmic veining of the material amplifies the electrifying motion of ripples and twists carved into the surface of the stone. Resembling billowing fabric knotted and pulled from all sides, the work exudes the palpable tension that animates the material. Mounted on the wall, the work refuses sculptural stillness: it behaves less as a contained object than as an event, echoing the Baroque impulse to collapse boundaries between body, material, and architecture, and to render matter as something perpetually in the act of becoming.

Lynda Benglis (b. 1941) is an American artist best known for her sculptural forms that challenge hierarchies between hard and soft, control and improvisation, permanence and movement. Benglis’ work is in extensive public collections including: Guggenheim Museum; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Museum of Modern Art, New York; The National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York. Most recently, Benglis was the subject of an international retrospective, which traveled to The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; The Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven; Le Consortium, Dijon; Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence; New Museum, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. Lynda Benglis lives and works in New York and Santa Fe.