Welded steel, circa 1990. 440x325x80 mm; 17 1/2x13x3 1/4 inches.
Rosenthal (1914-2009) is perhaps best known for his landmark, 15-foot high Cor-Ten steel cube, Alamo, 1967, poised on its tip, installed at Astor Place in lower Manhattan. Alamo was the first permanent contemporary outdoor public sculpture commissioned by the City of New York. Leading up to this significant career milestone, Rosenthal had received numerous other public commissions, and had also been producing smaller-scale studio sculpture of distinction for nearly two decades, first in Los Angeles and subsequently in New York. Since the late 1950s he experimented in a wide range of abstraction, from monolithic structures to more open geometric forms, often with elegant surface detailing concerned with effects of light and movement.
Provenance: the artist's estate, New York; private collection, Chicago.
