Robert Cronbach, Resident Artist Lecture 1959

Robert Cronbach gives a lecture at Skowhegan talking about the extended use of space and its impact on sculpture. Cronbach describes sculpture as a combination or arrangement of forms in space. He states how these forms create excitement and aesthetic response depending on the intensity of the image they project, or by their design. Cronbach believes that the design of sculpture is the sheer arrangement of these various masses through their size, direction, quality of form, and the surface of the form. Cronbach goes on to talk about the history of sculpture by sharing slides of sculptors throughout history. Cronbach begins with classical concepts of sculpture such as Michelangelo and Auguste Rodin, and the way they explored emotional and expressionistic surfaces. Cronbach then turns to modern artists including Alexander Calder, Alberto Giacometti, Henry Moore, and Louise Nevelson, and highlights their contributions to the medium. Cronbach tells the students that at the end of the day–as human beings–they will always get emotional excitement out of the human figure and its three-dimensional, plastic quality. Cronbach highlights how sculpture will always thrive because it contains a three-dimensional, spatial statement about the human being, a quality he believes is inherently fascinating to viewers.