Dan Flavin was an American minimalist artist famous for creating sculptural objects and installations from commercially available fluorescent light fixtures. The first works to incorporate electric light were his "Icons" series: eight colored square box-forms, constructed by the artist and his then-wife Sonja: these were fluorescent tubes with incandescent bulbs attached to their sides, and sometimes beveled edges. he "Diagonal of Personal Ecstasy, completed in 1963, was Flavin's first mature work; it marks the beginning of the artist's exclusive use of fluorescent light as a medium. In the decades that followed, he continued to use fluorescent structures to explore color, light and sculptural space, in works that filled gallery interiors. These structures cast both light and an eerily-colored shade, while taking a variety of forms, including "corner pieces", "barriers," and "corridors.
What I love about Flavin's work, similarly to Bruce Nauman's work, is the way the light affects the surrounding environment. The works themselves are visually stunning, and are brilliant works to photograph due to their clean nature which is always a positive in my idea of photography. The use of commercially available products adds a certain value to his work in my eyes, as it shows his creativity with materials that are available to anyone, not something specifically designed for the purpose of being an installation. Of the artists that have used light in their work, I have to say that Flavin is my favourite for all of these reasons.
