Donald Judd’s first use of unpainted plywood, a material that expanded the range of possibilities for scale and surface in his work, dates to 1972. As Judd wrote in 1990, “We go to a great deal of trouble to get a certain kind of plywood and the details of the construction are so unusual that the carpentry has become unique.”¹

In a 1987 interview, Judd said, “A lot of the materials were selected—the metal, the galvanized iron, for example, and plywood too before the galvanized iron—for their lightness and ability to define a volume without being massive. Then I could make a fairly large thing that was still light because I wanted to get away from the idea of weight and mass. I was more interested in volume.”² Judd used the dimensions of this piece in works dating from the early 1970s.

This work was exhibited in Donald Judd: New Sculpture at Margo Leavin Gallery, Los Angeles (November 18–December 30, 1989).

¹ Donald Judd, “Una stanza per Panza” (1990), in Donald Judd Writings, ed. Flavin Judd and Caitlin Murray (New York: Judd Foundation and David Zwirner Books, 2016), 656.

² Paul Cabon, interview with Donald Judd, 1987, transcript, Judd Foundation Archives, Marfa, Texas.