Naum GaboTwo Cubes (Demonstrating the Stereometric Method) 1930

Gabo used this work to illustrate his essay ‘Sculpture: Carving and Construction in Space’ in the anthology Circle. The two cubes show two ways of defining space in sculpture – one uses solid mass while the other expresses the form’s ‘inner space’. The latter was the key concept behind Gabo’s constructions; he sought to make the space occupied by an object visible without enclosing it. ‘Inner space’ was an example of what Gabo called the ‘Constructive idea’, where the boundaries between the object and the artist’s perceptions of that object were dissolved, so that ‘art becomes reality’.