On Kawara

For nearly 50 years Japanese-born artist On Kawara (29,771 days) devoted himself to a quiet practice of marking time, incrementally, via various methods and media. He is best known for a continuous series of monochromatic canvases, collectively titled Today, upon which each work’s date of execution is painted in precise white script. This installation features three Date Paintings from the Today series (1966–2013) by On Kawara that together commemorate the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission in July 1969. Each large-scale canvas bears a date documenting the mission’s launch (July 16, 1969), the landing of the lunar module (July 20), and man’s first steps on the moon (July 21). The Moon Landing triptych is installed in a skylighted room designed in close collaboration with the artist and his estate.