One and Three Blackboards

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One and Three Blackboards

Artist Joseph Kosuth (American, born 1945)

Date1965

Dimensions88 13/16 × 168 in. (225.6 × 426.7 cm)

MediumPortable blackboard, mounted photograph of blackboard, enlargement of the dictionary definition of “blackboard”

ClassificationSculpture

Credit LineGift of the artist

Object number

2021.1A-C

On View

Toledo Museum of Art (2445 Monroe Street), Gallery, 10

DescriptionThree different views of a blackboard: a photograph of a blackboard, an actual blackboard, and a dictionary definition of a blackboard.

Label TextBorn and raised in Toledo, Joseph Kosuth is a key figure in the development of Conceptual Art in the 20th century. In Conceptual Art the idea, rather than the object, is of primary importance. In this installation, he addresses the idea of a blackboard, and the relationship between object, image, and language/words, in a literal way. A blackboard is joined by a photograph of the same blackboard and the dictionary definition of “blackboard.” Kosuth is examining the very nature of art. Is art object or idea? Does it have to be beautiful? Does it even have to be physically made by the artist? Because One and Three Blackboards is a conceptual work, it is dated from the time of the idea’s first iteration. Kosuth’s first version was One and Three Chairs, 1965, now at the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Therefore, despite being created specifically for the Toledo Museum of Art in 2019, Blackboards is given a date of 1965. The actual blackboard of One and Three Blackboards is one that Kosuth used when he attended the Toledo Museum of Art’s Saturday art classes as a child.