Ringaround Arosie (1965)

Eva Hesse’s Radical Abstraction: The Making of Ringaround Arosie

In 1965, Eva Hesse created Ringaround Arosie, a work that distills her transition from figurative drawing to the abstract, process-driven practice that would define her legacy. This ink-and-gouache composition emerged during a pivotal year in Hesse’s career, as she abandoned the rigid structures of her earlier work in favor of fluid, organic forms. The piece belongs to a series of drawings where Hesse explored repetition and circularity—motifs that would later manifest in her three-dimensional sculptures. Unlike the geometric precision of Minimalism, her approach embraced irregularity, with each concentric ring varying in thickness and opacity.

The title itself hints at a playful subversion: “Ringaround” evokes childhood games, while “Arosie” (a nickname for Hesse’s friend, the artist Rosi Golan) grounds the abstraction in personal connection. This duality—between systematic repetition and intimate gesture—positions the work within Postminimalism, a movement that rejected Minimalism’s industrial detachment. As MoMA’s retrospective notes, Hesse’s drawings from this period “reveal a tension between control and spontaneity,” a quality palpable in the uneven edges and bleeding ink of Ringaround Arosie. The piece’s modest scale (originally 8½ × 11 inches) belies its conceptual ambition, offering a window into the artist’s evolving relationship with material and form.

1965: Hesse’s Break from Minimalism

By 1965, Eva Hesse had spent three formative years in Germany, where exposure to European modernism and the trauma of her Jewish family’s escape from Nazi persecution reshaped her artistic language. Returning to New York, she found herself at odds with the dominant Minimalist ethos—particularly its emphasis on impersonal fabrication. Ringaround Arosie exemplifies her rebellion: where artists like Donald Judd employed industrial materials and precise measurements, Hesse turned to hand-drawn circles, embracing the imperfections of her own touch. This period marked her shift toward “eccentric abstraction,” a term later coined by critic Lucy Lippard to describe work that merged systematic structures with idiosyncratic execution.

The drawing’s concentric rings recall targets or bullseyes, yet their irregular application disrupts any sense of mechanical reproduction. Hesse’s use of gouache—a medium prone to streaking and uneven coverage—further underscored her rejection of Minimalism’s pristine surfaces. As documented in the Tate’s archives, her 1965 works often combined “delicate washes with bold, almost violent marks,” a contrast evident in Ringaround Arosie’s interplay of faint outer rings and dense, ink-saturated centers. This tension between fragility and intensity would become a hallmark of her mature sculptures, where industrial materials like latex and fiberglass were manipulated to appear organic and decaying.

Ringaround Arosie is not a study in perfection but in persistence—the artist’s hand circling back, again and again, to a form that refuses to stabilize.

The Materiality of Ringaround Arosie

Composition: Repetition as Disruption

The work’s power lies in its deceptive simplicity. Hesse’s rings are neither perfectly concentric nor uniformly spaced, creating a rhythmic pulse that draws the eye inward. The outermost circles fade into the paper’s grain, while the innermost forms coalesce into a dense, almost three-dimensional void. This spatial ambiguity—between flatness and depth—prefigures her later sculptures, where viewers were similarly unsure whether to interpret forms as objects or shadows.

Medium: Gouache and Ink in Dialogue

Hesse exploited the distinct properties of her materials: the gouache’s matte opacity contrasts with the ink’s glossy sheen, while both media bleed unevenly into the paper’s fibers. The result is a surface that records its own making—each stroke’s pressure, each pool of diluted pigment. Unlike the hard-edge abstraction of her contemporaries, Ringaround Arosie bears the traces of its creation, from the faint pencil guidelines visible beneath the paint to the accidental splatters along the edges.

Displaying Ringaround Arosie in Contemporary Spaces

This print’s monochromatic palette and geometric foundation make it surprisingly versatile. In minimalist interiors, its graphic quality complements clean lines and neutral tones—try positioning it above a low console table or flanking a floor lamp in a living room. For maximalist spaces, the work’s organic imperfections provide a counterpoint to bold patterns; consider hanging it amidst a gallery wall of varied textures. The 30×40 cm size suits both intimate settings (like a home office or reading nook) and larger walls when grouped with other Hesse prints. Avoid overly warm lighting, which can mute the ink’s cool undertones; instead, opt for daylight-balanced LEDs to preserve the contrast between the gouache’s matte rings and the paper’s subtle tooth.

More Works by Eva Hesse

Explore Hesse’s evolution from figurative sketches to her signature abstract vocabulary with these framed prints.

Eva Hesse

Untitled 1

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Eva Hesse

Ingeminate November

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Eva Hesse

Repetition Nineteen Iii

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Eva Hesse

Vertiginous Detour

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