"If you follow an edge of a given work visually and follow it through quickly, you find the sense of rhythm and movement that you get in music." —Frank StellaBaroque music and 3D-printing collide in Frank Stella's k.161b, 2011, a striking sculpture that epitomizes the artist's tireless vision, technical innovation and playful sense of experimentation. While harkening back to the geometric forms and vibrant colors of Stella's earlier practice, the present work belongs to the discrete series of sculptures Stella made by harnessing the creative potential of Rapid Prototyping: first digitally scanning handcrafted forms and found objects, then manipulating and reconfiguring these into complex sculptures in a computer-aided design program, before printing them into solid form with a 3D-printer. This work notably features both an enclosed and open star motif, widely considered the most singular, reoccurring form in Stella’s oeuvre. This important motif is currently subject of the exhibition Frank Stella’s Stars, A Survey at The Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum.
While working at the forefront of the latest technologies, Stella with k.161b explores themes that take us back to the 17th century. A quintessential example of the artist’s Scarlatti series, the work’s title refers both to the Italian composer Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757) and to the Yale musicologist and harpsichordist Ralph Kirkpatrick (1911-84). The latter notably popularized Scaralatti’s oeuvre, producing the definitive 1953 catalogue of harpsichord sonatas whereby each sonata was assigned a “K” number. Beyond the literal reference to these sonatas with their titles, these works by Stella evoke the music of Scarlatti through their visual rhythm in a manner that brilliantly expands upon Goethe’s maxim that architecture is frozen music.
