licongallery

electric architectural sculptures by Carl Baumann

Carl Frederick Baumann

January 31, 1926 - April 30, 2003

Kaleidobox - 2000

Carl Baumann was a visionary artist who used architectural forms to express progressive social ideas and spiritual values. He coined the term "Licons" (lighted constructions) to describe his sculptures, which depict futuristic buildings and cities in miniature scale. A skilled craftsman, Baumann employed hidden machinery, arrays of tiny electric bulbs and working elevators in his creations, which frequently incorporated his childhood love of model trains.

Carl Baumann (1926-2003)", Exhibit catalog, Syracuse Museum of Science & Technology, 2005

I think it's great, exciting work, very much a part of our times. It has a quality of magic about it which is terribly important to art. And in addition to being an artistic success, it's also a kind of technical triumph. I'm very impressed.

Edward Cowley, Chairman, Art Department, State University of NY at Albany as told to reporter William Kennedy, Albany Times-Union, December 10, 1967

Albany, fair and fabled State capital though it is, is not noted for its art. Yet, as I discovered a few days ago, almost by accident, it has at the moment, housed in its venerable Institute of History and Art, an exhibition that is in many ways one of the most fascinating I have seen in some time. Called 'Art-in-Science,' it is an attempt to trace parallels in the developments in modern abstract art and in advanced scientific discoveries...

Robert M. Coates

"Art and Nature, Science and Art"

The New Yorker, October 16, 1965

Oil Refinery, metal sculpture by Carl Baumann of Rensselaer First Prize, Sculpture, Art-in-Science Regional Competition