TOM WESSELMANN: DRAWN IN STEEL: METAL EDITIONS

Galerie Lelong & Co. is delighted to be presenting a group of Tom Wesselmann’s "steel drawings" for the first time.

January 16 - March 8, 2025

While collage and assemblage play a large part in the artist’s work, drawing had always been a fundamental aspect of his practice, as it was for his contemporary Roy Lichtenstein.

What sets Wesselmann apart is his search for a drawing in which the line, whether in black or in colour, is free from the paper and slightly detached from the wall on which it rests. From the mid-1980s onwards, the artist began his "Steel Drawings", which would later lead to the "Metal Editions" that are the subject of this exhibition.

In a text from September 2003, he expressed himself very simply and clearly on this work: "The biggest departure in my work was in laser-cut steel. The original premise was to make drawings in steel as though they magically had just been drawn in steel. All of the act of drawing was still present: the spontaneity, the false line etc. At that time, sophisticated computer laser technology was not yet available but slowly came along to assist my intentions.”

“The steel line drawings looked like they were drawn on the wall and I was intrigued that you could pick up a drawing by the lines and hold it."