Perception

Harry Roseman
Three Doors, 1978–1982
Bronze, patina
Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art Collection
Gift of the Las Vegas Art Museum, 2021; Gift of Patrick Duffy and Wally Goodman, Goodman
Duffy Collection, 2008.
2021.08.172

The doors in Harry Roseman’s sculpture draw attention to the cropped flatness of the relief by teasing us with the possibility that there might be other rooms in the impossibly narrow area behind them. At the time this sculpture was made, Roseman’s work was focused on paradoxes of perception, the possibility that an artwork could be physically small and nonetheless appear to contain a vast space. Considering Three Doors, he talks about “compressing the space and relief in relationship to what I actually saw. ... Half of what we see is what we know and not what we’re seeing, and it’s not easy to jettison that information, because it’s so much a part of how we move through the world.” He suggests that his method of sculpting his perception might have been fueled by his childhood fascination with Egyptian art and the miniaturized worlds of train sets and dioramas. Based in New York City, he mentions his trips to Las Vegas to visit family, and points out that the façade of the New York-New York Hotel & Casino is another kind of flattened building scape. (DKS)

To watch our Virtual Tour of this piece, please click on the following link: Barrick Museum of Art Virtual Tour - Harry Roseman.

Item Description:
A bronze relief sculpture of three doors on raised, angular walls. Two of the doors face each other. A pair of empty walls separates them from the third door. Each door has its own pattern of square and oblong panels while the walls are featureless.