Beverly Pepper"Untitled" Beverly Pepper, Ultra Marine Blue and Steel Architectural Sculpturecirca 1965-1970
circa 1965-1970
About the Item
- Creator:Beverly Pepper (1922, American)
- Creation Year:circa 1965-1970
- Dimensions:Height: 6 in (15.24 cm)Width: 6.75 in (17.15 cm)Depth: 3.125 in (7.94 cm)
- Medium:
- Movement Style:
- Period:
- Condition:
- Gallery Location:New York, NY
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU1841216655282
Beverly Pepper
Celebrated internationally for her large-scale abstract sculptures and site-specific works, provocative environmental artist Beverly Pepper was renowned for her ability to transform unwieldy industrial metals such as Cor-Ten steel and cast iron into seemingly weightless objets d’art.
Born in 1922 in Brooklyn, New York, Pepper studied advertising design, photography and industrial design at Pratt Institute before embarking on a career as a commercial art director. Meanwhile, she also attended the Art Students League and studied art theory at Brooklyn College under Hungarian painter György Kepes, who introduced her to the works of Man Ray and László Moholy-Nagy.
In 1949, Pepper shifted her interest from commercial art to painting, studying in Paris at the Académie de la Grande Chaumière. There, she met Cubist painters André Lhote and Fernand Léger, and visited the studios of Constantin Brâncusi and Ossip Zadkine. Pepper’s work at the time, owing to her experiences in Europe following the war, was largely characterized by a social realist perspective.
Pepper developed a passion for sculpting following a trip to Angkor Wat in Cambodia in 1960. She made her debut in 1962 with a series of carved tree trunks at a gallery in Rome. That same year, Pepper was invited to exhibit at the “Festival of Two Worlds” show in Spoleto, Italy alongside the likes of Henry Moore and Alexander Calder. To prepare for the exhibition, Pepper quickly learned how to weld and soon became an accomplished metalworker — an unusual skill for women at the time.
By the late 1960s and 1970s, Pepper became known for her stainless-steel abstract and still-life sculptures such as Matera Scatolata. She also created several abstract geometric, foil-embossed collage prints including Collage 1 and Collage 3. In later years, she used heavier materials including bronze, iron and Cor-Ten steel in her modern monumental works such as Curved Presence.
Throughout her sculpting career, Pepper had countless solo exhibitions and participated in group shows, and won several awards, including the Allied Arts Honor Award by the American Institute of Architects in 1999, the Alexander Calder Prize in 2000 and the International Sculpture Center Lifetime Achievement Award in 2013. Her sculptures are part of the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington, D.C. and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among others.
On 1stDibs, discover authentic Beverly Pepper sculptures and prints.
You May Also Like
2010s American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Bronze, Enamel
20th Century American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Bronze
Mid-20th Century American Modern Figurative Sculptures
Bronze
1960s American Modern Figurative Sculptures
Marble, Bronze
Late 20th Century American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Bronze
Late 20th Century American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Bronze
1950s American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Steel
Samuel CashwanMid-Century Metal and Colored Glass Sculpture - Like Stained Glass - Gaudi, 1955 circa
Mid-20th Century American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Brass, Copper
1990s American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Metal
20th Century American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Metal
More From This Seller
View All1990s American Modern Figurative Sculptures
Stone, Bluestone, Bronze
1940s American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Cast Stone
1940s American Modern Abstract Sculptures
Cast Stone
1980s Constructivist Abstract Sculptures
Enamel, Iron
1980s Minimalist Abstract Sculptures
Metal
1950s Abstract Abstract Sculptures
Steel




