Numbers on Wall
Jan Dibbets
Dutch, born 1941
1970
A gelatin silver print in which Jan Dibbets photographed twelve near-identical views of a white gallery wall and numbered them, turning a banal interior into a controlled visual inventory.
You encounter a strict grid of twelve pale panels—mostly blank walls with the occasional door or shadow—each small numeral centering the frame and making the ordinary read as examined and serial.
Aligned with conceptual art, the work uses serial photography and labeling to expose how measurement, documentation, and systems govern our perception of architectural space and the photographic image.
Medium
Gelatin silver print
Dimensions
9 1/2 × 12" (24.1 × 30.5 cm)
Classification
Department
Credit
Anonymous gift
Accession
221.2014.42
Palette
Exhibitions
