Robert Engman

Engman was born in 1927 to parents who had emigrated from Sweden. He joined the Navy at the age of 15, serving in World War II in the Pacific. He graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design with a BFA, and from Yale University with an MFA in Painting and in Sculpture (1955), where he studied with sculptor José de Rivera{{cite web |title=Sculptor Robert Engman featured in monographic exhibition at the Michener Art Museum |url=https://artdaily.cc/news/91962/Sculptor-Robert-Engman-featured-in-monographic-exhibition-at-the-Michener-Art-Museum |publisher=Art Daily |date=December 29, 2016}} and Josef Albers.[http://www.yale.edu/publicart/column.html Column, 1963, Public art at Yale] Albers wrote of him: “Only a few independent ones were courageous enough to concentrate on the plane—the in-between of volume and line—as a broad sculptural concept and promise.”{{cite web|title=Robert Engman|url=https://listart.mit.edu/sites/default/files/Engman_Robert.pdf|website=List Visual Arts Center|publisher=MIT|accessdate=2017-03-19}}

Engman taught sculpture at Yale University, and, in 1960, was appointed director of Yale's sculpture program in its Graduate School of Fine Arts. He worked closely with Josef Albers, James Rosati, Ann Lehman, and Paul Rudolph, and produced his monumental work, Column, (1963) for Rudolph's new building for the Yale Art & Architecture program.[https://culturenow.org/entry&permalink=09110&seo=Column_Robert-Engman-and-Yale-University Engman, Robert, Column, (1963)] Culture Now: Museum Without Walls. Retrieved 2020-3-20

Represented by Arthur and Madeleine Lejwa's influential Galerie Chalette[https://collections.si.edu/search/results.htm?q=Engman%2C+Robert&start=0 Galerie Chalette Records], Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Museum, Washington, DC. in New York, his work attracted the attention of Joseph Hirshhorn, who began to actively collect Engman's sculptures.

In 1964, Engman moved to Pennsylvania, where he became director of the University of Pennsylvania's graduate studies in sculpture. He was a frequent visiting critic at East Coast schools of art during his teaching career. In the 1960s and '70s, his career flourished, with successful New York gallery shows and larger and larger scale commissions, culminating in Triune,(1975) a 20-foot-high structure of interlocking bronze curves.

The physical effort required to complete Triune brought a check to Engman's artistic drive to "dominate the materials."{{cite book |last1=Rosner |first1=Stanley |last2=Abt |first2=Lawrence Edwin |title=The Creative Experience |date=1970 |publisher=University of Michigan |page=382}} In 1978, he changed his approach to art. With rare exceptions, Engman eschewed the factory approach to sculpture, preferring to personally construct his pieces. He retreated from the world of large-scale commissions, and began work on a series of more intimately-scaled pieces that did not require a workshop of helpers to complete.

The sinuous curves of Engman's work are derived from the artist’s explorations of minimal surfaces to generate sculptural form. Minimal surfaces are mathematically the most economical connections between loops or lines in three-dimensional space. Engman created assemblages of minimal surface configurations to form geometrically-based sculptures that could, at the time of their production, be described mathematically only after they had been physically created in metal or wood. In Engman's own words, "they cannot be conceived of through any other system than that of the giving of substance to thought."{{cite web|title=CultureNOW - Untitled: Robert Engman and MIT Public Art Collection|url=http://culturenow.org/entry&permalink=09239&seo=Untitled_Robert-Engman-and-MIT-Public-Art-Collection|website=culturenow.org|accessdate=2017-03-19}}

Others have been fascinated with the science and mathematics of such surfaces, including the late R. Buckminster Fuller.[http://www.philart.net/artist.php?id=64 Robert Engman page, Philadelphia Public Art @ philart.net]

• A Study in Growth, (1958) in the MOMA permanent collection.[https://www.moma.org/collection/works/80861?artist_id=1737&locale=en&page=1&sov_referrer=artist Engman, Robert, A Study in Growth,] MOMA, New York, NY. Object number 27.1960. Retrieved 2020-3-20
• Engman's work in the Hirshhorn is represented by two large scale pieces, Untitled, (1968-1969), and After Iyengar (1978), and upwards of thirty of his smaller works.
• Works in the Whitney: Construction, (1960),[https://whitney.org/collection/works/671 Construction 1960, Robert Engman, (1960)], Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Accession: 66.22. Moon, Number 2, (1964).[https://whitney.org/collection/works/670 Moon, Number 2, Robert Engman, (1964)], Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Accession: 65.7.
• His largest sculpture, Triune (1975), continues to stand at the southwest corner of Philadelphia City Hall.
• Kings (1975) is at 78th and Lindbergh Streets, also in Philadelphia.
• Students collaborated with Engman to create the Peace Symbol (1967) sculpture which was installed in front of the Van Pelt Library at Penn in 1983.{{Cite web|url=http://culturenow.org/entry&permalink=08415&seo=Peace-Symbol_Robert-Engman-and-University-of-Pennsylvania|title=CultureNOW - Peace Symbol: Robert Engman and University of Pennsylvania}}

MIT Barker Library.jpg|Untitled (1968), suspended inside the Great Dome at MIT

Tiune Engman.JPG|Triune (1975), near Philadelphia City Hall

Peace symbol Penn.JPG|Peace Symbol (1967) was created in collaboration with Penn students

Peace symbol Penn Detail.JPG|Peace Symbol, detail (1967)

:Recent Sculpture U.S.A (May - Aug 1959) MOMA, New York, NY

:Structured Sculpture (1960), Galerie Chalette, New York, NY

:Modern Sculpture from the Joseph H. Hirshhorn Collection (Oct 1962 - Jan 1963), Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY

:Annual Exhibition 1966: Contemporary Sculpture and Prints (Dec 1966 - Feb 1967), Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY

:Recent Sculpture (Feb - Mar 1960), Stable Gallery, New York, NY

:Shifting the Limits: Robert Engman’s Structural Sculpture (Oct 2016 - Feb 2017), James A. Michener Art Museum, Doylestown, PA

{{reflist|30em}}

• Schiffer, Nancy. Robert Engman: Structural Sculpture. Schiffer: Philadelphia, Pennsvylvania (2013) {{ISBN|9780764342295}}
• Robert Engman et al. Robert Engman Sculpture: Theme and Variations. Schiffer: Philadelphia, Pennsvylvania (2017) {{ISBN|978-0764352751}}

• Dennet, Scot, [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JNioQ8T-3A Bob Engman in the Studio] Denett Entertainment (2015) Retrieved 2020-04-14.
• Cook, Bonnie L., [https://www.inquirer.com/philly/obituaries/robert-m-engman-91-creator-of-sculptures-great-and-small-20180710.html Obituaries: Robert M. Engman, 91, creator of sculptures great and small. The Philadelphia Inquirer (July 18, 2018) Retrieved 2020-03-19].

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Category:1927 births

Category:2018 deaths

Category:Rhode Island School of Design alumni

Category:Yale School of Art alumni

Category:Yale University faculty

Category:University of Pennsylvania faculty

Category:People from Belmont, Massachusetts

Category:Sculptors from Massachusetts

Category:United States Navy personnel of World War II

Category:20th-century American sculptors

Category:American male sculptors

Category:20th-century American male artists