Fred Eversley
American, 1941-

Untitled, 1975
cast polyester resin
19 1/4 x 19 1/4 x 2 1/4 in.

SBMA, Gift of the Estate of Robert K. Straus
1997.79.2



Fred Eversley at home in New York City. Photo © 2019 Taylor Dafoe.

"I retired from engineering. I was living in Venice, California, surrounded by all the artists and all the jazz people and all of that, and I just started making art, and I had good success. I was having shows three months after I started making art and it culminated in a one-man show at the Whitney Museum, I guess two years after I started making art." - Smithsonian Oral History Interview,
August 19, 2020

RESEARCH PAPER

Untitled 1975 is a clear cast polyester resin. It is a 3-dimensional circle with a hollow center floating toward the top. The base of the circle is about 4" deep narrowing to less than l" at the top. The inner hollow circle is about 3" above the base but less than l" from the top. Although the plastic is clear it reflects nearby colors and light in the room.

‘Elegant’ and 'sensual' are the words used most frequently to describe the molded plastic sculptures of Frederick Eversley. In a positive reference, comments will be made on his ‘cool detachment or on the whole range of activity that can be seen looking through his tinted spheres, or on the subtle light effects or complex optical effects or his sleekly geometric approach.

But Thomas H. Garver in an article on several artists in the April 1971 issue of Art Forum, though making similar comments, is more negative. "Eversley's works are pretty because they are elegant in shape, seductive in color and obviously complex of manufacture. One admires them rather as one admires Faberge Easter Eggs or crystal flowers. They ‘look’ as though they took laborious hours to make up and polish, and certainly they make perfect coffee table conversation pieces as well as being perfect coffee table sizes. Endless remarks about their subtlety (which hardly makes them subtle) and craftsmanship will be heard.... They are closed in form, easily comprehensible objects which radiate a clearcut "effect". The crystalized closed circular shape is easily and directly understood. It is an object, perfect in its completion, yet seemingly given purpose beyond its form by the visual effect one perceives when looking through the work. Thus the object not only exists, but it "does something" as well, gratifying for the moment, but one quickly finds that the "something" the work "does" is 1-dimensional and its ability to sustain interest terminates quickly".

Prepared for the Docent Council by Barbara Salibi, July 1980.

Bibliography

Art in America, Volume 58, September 1971, p. 35
Art Forum, Volume 91, April 1971, p. 87
Art International, Volume 15, February 1971, p. 78
Art News, Volume 73, December 1974, p. 63

NOTE: The above sources are all short articles commenting on the work of several artists showing at various galleries at that particular time. No biographical information on Eversley was included in the articles.


SBMA CURATORIAL LABELS

This lens appears to radiate energy from within, like a star in the void of outer space. Made by spinning resin in a mold
affixed to a turntable, this lens is thinnest at its translucent middle and thickens towards its opaque edges. Before becoming a path-breaking African-American artist in California’s Light and Space movement, Eversley studied electrical engineering at Carnegie Mellon, where he immersed himself in calculus, physics, and computer programming. He later worked in Los Angeles’s aerospace industry but befriended artists in the bohemian neighborhood of Venice Beach. He understands energy from the perspective of an engineer and an artist. He says, “The genesis of energy is central to the mystery of our existence as animate beings in an inanimate universe.”

- Contemporary Gallery Opening, 2021