Richard Tuttle: What Is the Object? is the contemporary American artist’s exploration of the meaning of objects through a presentation of items that he collected over the past five decades. Although the titular question relates to the artist, it also extends to the visitor: What, how, and why do objects hold and convey meaning? In this exhibition, Tuttle’s objects are displayed with index cards that document his encounters with them, exhibition furniture that he made on which the objects and cards rest, and ribbons of text that he wrote, which hang from the gallery’s walls. A book designed by Luc Derycke extends the challenging question, presenting an object that moves beyond the utopian space of the gallery into our everyday life.

For Tuttle, the object, and the work associated with thinking about an object, is intended for communication. The energy that we receive from learning about ourselves can be given to another person. “I collect to find something beautiful in myself,” Tuttle explains. “Art is finding that beautiful thing inside us (the beauty that is us). And once one sees this in and for oneself, one is going to look for and accord the same thing to others. That’s the politics in this.” The way that we treat objects is similar to how we treat people. Objects provide a new “ethics”—an ethics from the object. The relation of distant objects can be a model for the relation of distant people. Exploring this, Tuttle feels, is something that can be done best in an academic, rather than a commercial, setting. Hence the exhibition at the Bard Graduate Center Gallery and this accompanying website.

On the occasion of this exhibition, Tuttle has bestowed a gift of objects from his collection to Bard Graduate Center. They will comprise the Richard Tuttle Study Collection, which will be used for teaching and exploration by students, faculty, and staff.

Exhibition dates: March 25–July 10, 2022