Seven Panels and Index

Hanne Darboven is known for ordered notations that utilize numbers, particularly permutations of the calendar, as their systematic focus and structure. In the 1970s, she introduced transcriptions of texts (including those by Charles Baudelaire and Jean-Paul Sartre), diagrams, and abstract marks into her work. Monumental in scale, Seven Panels and Index exemplifies the artist’s practice of covering ordinary composition paper with undulating lines associated with handwriting; here her lines resemble the cursive form of the lowercase letter l. Darboven’s compulsively detailed, laboriously produced script emphasizes the process of mark making by evoking text while remaining abstract, and explores the passage of time as it is experienced both historically and personally.