Holt's "Locators with Loci" on view in "Minimal" at the Bourse de Commerce

We are delighted to share that Nancy Holt's 1972 work Locators with Loci is on view in the exhibition Minimal at the Bourse de Commerce, opening today in Paris.

Locators with Loci belongs to series of sculptures that began in 1971 when Nancy Holt made her first sculptures—“seeing devices” drawing attention to visual perception and place. The Locators, as she named them, comprise industrial piping welded into a T-shape, made to be viewed through with one eye to direct attention to the time-bound processes of vision. The Locators directly develop from Holt’s experiments with photography, and they provide a means to locate perception. Nancy Holt expanded the visual language in her Locators through the use of mirrors and what she called “Loci”—painted ellipses that resolve into perfect black circles edged with a ring of light when looking through the Locators. She experimented with Loci this first in Locator (Studio Corner) in her New York City studio in 1971, and later in 1972 with Dual LocatorsLocator with Mirror, and Locators with Loci. 

Locators with Loci brings together a group of four Locators whose viewpoint shifts in angle and distance from the wall. Each Locator looks to a painted black Loci, which graduate from a perfect circle to an elongated ellipse. Although the shapes on the wall shift are not identical, when one looks through each Locator they see a perfect black circle edged by a ring of light, an experience to seeing a full moon on a clear night or an eclipse.

Minimal is a major exhibition at the Bourse de Commerce focusing on Minimal art that brings together an exceptional group of works from the Pinault Collection in dialogue with those of prestigious collections. Minimal traces the diversity of this movement since the 1960s, when a whole generation of artists initiated a radical approach to art. The exhibition is curated by Jessica Morgan, director of Dia Art Foundation, who has selected over a hundred works by some forty international artists.

Nancy Holt's Locators with Loci is on view in Minimal at the Bourse de Commerce in Paris through January 18, 2026.

Nancy Holt, Locators with Loci (1972)
Installation view: Nancy Holt: Circles of Light, Gropius Bau, Berlin, Germany, 2024
Four steel pipes, black paint
Overall dimensions variable (site responsive; Locators 60 x 12 x 2 in. (152 x 31 x 5 cm) each
Photograph: Luca Girardini
© Holt/Smithson Foundation / Licensed by Artists Rights Society, New York

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