A Painting of a Soup Can

William Anastasi is an American Conceptual and Minimal artist. His work is interdisciplinary and includes sculpture, painting, drawing, and installation. Some of William Anastasi’s early works used construction materials, but his work constantly changed throughout his career and there were no limits on the mediums used. He was interested in the relationship between the seen and the unseen, exploring the space between seeing and perceiving, and the element of chance in art. William Anastasi’s early work includes Relief (1961), a sculpture made of wood and cement, which he then urinated on, and Microphone (1961), which was a tape recorder that recorded itself. These pieces are among the earliest Conceptual works. Another key work, Sink (1963 – late 1970s), is an early Minimal work. Sink is a slab of steel which had water poured onto it constantly, and changed over time as the water caused it to rust. William Anastasi’s drawing work includes the Blind Drawings series, in which he drew blindfolded while listening to classical music, allowing the music to dictate his movements. This later expanded into other drawing series that included sensory deprivation, such as the Subway Drawings. These drawings were created by allowing the motion of a subway car to dictate his drawings. He wore noise-cancelling headphones so the noise of the subway would not influence his movements.