Acquisition News: Nasher Sculpture Center acquires first work by Hadzi
Dimitri Hadzi (1921-2006) "Terra III," 1964-67, 49 x 46 x 26 in (124.5 x 116.8 x 66 cm)
Dallas, TX – The Estate of Dimitri Hadzi and Artist Estate Studio are pleased to announce the acquisition of a major bronze sculpture Terra III (1964-67) by the Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, TX. It is the first work by the artist to enter the Nasher's collection.
"The Nasher Sculpture Center is delighted with the acquisition of Terra III, the first work by Dimitri Hadzi to enter our collection. Terra III perfectly exemplifies the artist's long investigation on the relation between abstraction and classicism. The sculpture is a welcome addition to the Nasher's rich holdings of modern abstraction, where it joins works by contemporaries such as Henry Moore, David Smith, and Willem de Kooning."
— Carlos Basualdo, Director, Nasher Sculpture Center
Born in New York City to Greek immigrant parents, Dimitri Hadzi grew up steeped in the mythology, history, and language of ancient Greece. After serving in the Army Air Force during World War II, he studied painting and sculpture at Cooper Union. A Fulbright scholarship then took him to Athens to study Greco-Roman sculpture. He settled in Rome, where he lived and worked for some 25 years. In 1962, he represented the United States at the Venice Biennale alongside Louise Nevelson. In 1975, he joined the faculty at Harvard, where he became the university's first tenured professor of studio arts.
Cast in his study in Rome, Terra III shows Hadzi's signature fusion of modernist abstraction and classical form— ancient myth given new shape in cast bronze. Its title invokes Terra, the Roman name for the primordial earth goddess the Greeks called Gaia, mother of the Titans and the ground from which all things rose. It's a fitting subject for a Greek-American sculptor working in the heart of ancient Rome.
Hadzi went on to create major public commissions across the country, including Thermopylae at the John F. Kennedy Federal Building in Boston and the monumental 10,000-pound basalt stone arch sculpture River Legend at the Edith Green-Wendell Wyatt Federal Building in Portland. His work already has a home in Dallas. Bishop's Triad, three soaring columns of New Hampshire granite, has stood on the St. Paul Street plaza of One Dallas Centre since its dedication in 1980. Hadzi developed the 45-ton work in close collaboration with the building's architect, Henry N. Cobb of I. M. Pei & Partners.
