Introduction: The following interview between Ron Gorchov and Susan Logan was originally published on the occasion of the exhibition “Early Work By Five Contemporary Artist: Ron Gorchov, Elizabeth Murray, Dennis Oppenheim, Dorothea Rockburne, Joel Shapiro.”

Organized by The New Museum, the exhibition was the first to be held at 65 Fifth Avenue. The aim was to reexamine early work by five artists whose importance was clearly established in 1977, but whose earlier work had never received public exposure. The intention of the exhibition was to examine these crucial early works in light of the evolution of the five artists' careers, and see in what way these pieces anticipated their present concerns. The exhibition was held November 11-December 30, 1977.

The interview is transcribed without edit below. Download the original catalogue here.

SL: When you look back over your work from different periods what things surprise you the most? 

RG: My new work really surprises me a lot. Then there's one painting I did in 1956. It's a large painting, probably eight feet tall by six feet wide. It's on four pieces of paper glued onto heavy linen fabric and sewn together. It was the first painting I did where I felt like I could do something unusual. Then the next painting that really surprised me was Mine in 1969. I couldn't do anything for a while after that because it really had to be more refined to get anything done.

SL: Was that the first curved canvas?

RG: Yes. Since then almost every painting has really been a surprise. Like I've really been shocked. I've been amazed I've been able to do something with such a strict format for so long. Recently a young painter asked me what direction I thought my work will be taking. Well, I have no idea. I said that as long as I feel that the work has a certain power to it, then I'll keep doing it. When you feel as if you're losing your power, that's when you want to cast around for another means. It's really that I'll keep doing this kind of work as long as it gives me a feeling of discovery.

SL: You have said of Mine that after you finished it, you had to rationalize its structure. What do you mean?

RG: I realized I couldn't go on unless I could build the stretchers more easily. Also I hated the curves in it; I wanted softer corners. I had to study those curves, really work it out and rationalize it so I could understand it well enough to make many.

SL: How did you study it?

RG: Mostly trial and error.

SL: How important is the idea of being rational in your work?

RG: The only reason I think to be rational about anything is to make the work easier to realize. You can't materialize them, unless you rationalize them to some extent. When something is rational, you have a way of saying how to do the work.

SL: So it's a method of being able to work.

RG: Yes. If everything is just built one of a kind, it can be gerrybuilt. Do you know the expression, gerrybuilt? It means no system. You can make almost anything that way. But I wanted them to be able to do a lot of things. I wanted them to stand shipping and to be very movable. They can be handled pretty easily without damaging the canvas. The canvas is fragile. The stretcher is designed to give a backing. Those were all the rational reasons. They have nothing to do with the art.

SL: It's interesting that you talk about the construction of the painting in terms of defense of protecting the fragility, yet the structure gives an aggressiveness to the painting.

RG: I don't think that makes the paintings aggressive. I mean first of all they're exposed, the surface is very fragile. The reason I think that people think they're aggressive is because they're unfamiliar. I think the more positive word would be affirmative. They declare themselves and I suppose that's aggressive. The shape isn't more aggressive than other art.

SL: Your work is very symmetrical. What do you think about symmetry?

RG: I don' t like symmetry. I never thought that I'd be doing symmetrical paintings. That's one of the surprises in my new work. I got interested in symmetry because I don't understand it. I don't like it. I have a kind of traumatic reaction to it. It repels me. I've been doing these paintings because there' s still the fascination or repulsion with symmetry.

SL: It's as though the paintings have the most reduced kind of symmetry, almost primitive.

RG: "Primitive" has so many connotations but I think it's definitely elementary. Also it' s not exactly symmetrical. It's about as good as I can do without measuring. It's just symmetrical enough to be confusing. 

SL: Is it important to you what you can do without measuring, I mean without being exact?

RG: That's not a consideration either. It's just too much trouble to measure. If it' s going to be more trouble to redraw until I get it right, then I'll measure. But then the funny thing is it usually drifts off after I've been painting awhile, which is fine.

SL: Is your own physicality a consideration in the measurement and size of your work?

RG: It's not really but I think it's part of the way I limit the work.

SL: So you are your own limitation for the size of your work.

RG: Right. I try not to put the marks out of reach.

SL: How does color relate to your work?

RG: Well, I'm more conscious now about colors than I used to be. When I started painting, my idea of color was to get as many different colors and shades in a painting as possible while having it look relatively simple. The other thing that I tried was to do paintings that no one could walk away from and say that it was a yellow or a red painting. I remember thinking of paintings by Piero della Francesca or Rogier van der Weyden which strike me as being no particular color. So the idea of those early paintings was to do a painting that had a lot of strong colors in it from which you could walk away thinking they were neutral. And every now and then, I want to do that again. Some paintings I do now satisfy that in a way.

SL: Do you make your own paint?

RG: Oh yes. I mean I don't make them all but many of them I do. I grind them right on the spot. I'm really interested in the pigment. I'm always interested in the right pigment system with the least amount of binder to make it stick. So, I'm really more interested in the mechanics of color than its hue. When I'm looking for a color, I'm looking for a certain feel to it, how it's going to spread. In almost every case, if it spreads right, it's going to be the right color.

SL: Do colors have certain associations or meanings for you?

RG: Well, if I'm aware of associations, I try not to make them. I try to add my own sense of life to traditional associations. For instance, I know that red and black are supposedly colors of death, tragic colors. If I'm aware that I'm doing a painting that has a heavy historic and poetic connotation, like those colors do, then it's really an important decision to add my own feelings to it so that I change the tradition of that color. The idea is to change the tradition of the color. 

SL: I' m curious about why you use two colors and how your attitude toward color has changed.

RG: Well, I may find that a particular color repels me. I won't be able to use it at all. And that's exactly the color that I would want to use or try to use symmetry because I don't understand it. I don't like it. I have a kind of traumatic reaction to it. It repels me. I've been doing these paintings because there's still the fascination or repulsion with symmetry.

SL: It's as though the paintings have the most reduced kind of symmetry, almost primitive.

RG: "Primitive" has so many connotations but I think it's definitely elementary. Also it' s not exactly symmetrical. It's about as good as I can do without measuring. It's just symmetrical enough to be confusing.

SL: Is it important to you what you can do without measuring, I mean without being exact.

RG: That's not a consideration either. It's just too much trouble to measure. If it' s going to be more trouble to redraw until I get it right, then I' ll measure. But then the funny thing is it usually drifts off after I've been painting awhile, which is fine.

SL: Is your own physicality a consideration in the measurement and size of your work?

RG: It's not really but I think it' s part of the way I limit the work.

SL: So you are your own limitation for the size of your work.

RG: Right. I try not to put the marks out of reach.

SL: How does color relate to your work?

RG: Well, I'm more conscious now about colors than I used to be. When I started painting, my idea of color was to get as many different colors and shades in a painting as possible while having it look relatively simple. The other thing that I tried was to do paintings that no one could walk away from and say that it was a yellow or a red painting. I remember thinking of paintings by Piero della Francesca or Rogier van der Weyden which strike me as being no particular color. So the idea of those early paintings was to do a painting that had a lot of strong colors in it from which you could walk away thinking they were neutral. And every now and then, I want to do that again. Some paintings I do now satisfy that in a way.

SL: Do you make your own paint?

RG: Oh yes. I mean I don't make them all but many of them I do. I grind them right on the spot. I'm really interested in the pigment. I'm always interested in the right pigment system with the least amount of binder to make it stick. So, I'm really more interested in the mechanics of color than its hue. When I'm looking for a color, I'm looking for a certain feel to it, how it's going to spread. In almost every case, if it spreads right, it's going to be the right color. 

SL: Do colors have certain associations or meanings for you?

RG: Well , if I'm aware of associations, I try not to make them. I try to add my own sense of life to traditional associations. For instance, I know that red and black are supposedly colors of death, tragic colors. If I'm aware that I'm doing a painting that has a heavy historic and poetic connotation, like those colors do, then it's really an important decision to add my own feelings to it so that I change the tradition of that color. The idea is to change the tradition of the color.

SL: I' m curious about why you use two colors and how your attitude toward color has changed. 

RG: Well, I may find that a particular color repels me. I won't be able to use it at all. And that's exactly the color that I would want to use or try to use but in a way they're more materialistic than businessmen. Businessmen often aren't interested in the matter of what they do; they just want profit. Whereas artists really want to make things out of matter, to transform matter. I really think that artists feel that if they don't know what matter is, they're not going to understand spirit. And the fact is that transforming matter, doing wonderful things with matter- all that costs money. The whole idea of the art marketplace as a world for testing is very worldly. I think that part of a lot of artists' destinies is not to be sheltered in monasteries or cloisters, in institutions beyond the world, but to be tested by the world.

My rationalization for selling work is a whole other thing. My major passion is to make art and I can't take care of all the art I make. So I want someone to take care of it for me. In a sense, people just have to be bonded to prove to me that they can take care of the work. So selling serves a double purpose. It takes care of me so that I can make more art and it proves to me that the art will be cared for.

SL: What things outside of art influence your work?

RG: A lot of things. Movies, for example. Just the tonality of movies, like the tonalities of 1940's technicolor movies, really influence my colors.

SL: There was something in some reviews of your work in the late fifties that said you were influenced by the architecture of old movie houses.

RG: Yeah, it's true. Some of those movie houses were sort of Byzantine and Oriental. The movie houses had an idea of ancient splendor, an Oriental idea. That kind of splendor just doesn't exist anymore. They used to have ballrooms, grand pianos covered in gold leaf, incredible vases, eighteenth century paintings, Baroque thrones, hangings and rugs, marble floors. 

SL: Your paintings are so elemental that I would never have suspected that you have a taste for the Baroque.

RG: Right. These paintings are just simply pared down. The whole idea is that paintings are like stopping time, static images. You don't need much to make time stand still.

SL: Are there any artists who have particularly influenced you?

RG: Well, it's pretty well known that I was close to John Graham. Also Tony Smith was my first supporter and first big influence. Then after that, it's been younger artists who've been the biggest influence on me, like Marilyn Lenkowsky and Lynda Benglis. I've also been interested in Al Held, as an argument against what I'm doing. Work doesn't always have to be like yours to influence you. If something that someone else is doing is considered so important, then you've got to come up with something that can be compared to it as another context. My work is in many ways a response to certain artists' work. That's how artists influence each other-by creating the context, asking the questions, and giving a response. Certain conditions have to exist before you can do something, you know. Most art is based on conditions that an artist suddenly sees as an opportunity. Almost all good art, I think, has a lot to do with that.

SL: How do you feel about showing this early work? 

RG: This is really a terrific opportunity. As a result, I' m sure that I'll think more about experiments with things that might not get shown for many years. You know one of the most interesting things you can do is to go back say fifteen or twenty years and remind someone of a particular situation. You'll remember it and remind them-"You were sitting there, you said such and such, and I said, "Recently, I titled a small painting Retarded Terror because I had just seen Carl Andre that night before I did the painting. I knew him back in the early sixties. We were teasing each other about the old days. Once he had come to see my paintings and said, "You know, you're a terrific painter, but your paintings are retardataire." You know, the French word for "not hip."

SL: You mean not avant-garde?

RG: Right. So when I reminded him of that time, he said, "I didn't say your paintings were retardataire. I said you were a 'retarded terror."' The thing is he remembered. He had to come up with something. 

END