In the early 1960s, inspired by the plastic sculptures of modernist artists László Moholy-Nagy and Antoine Pevsner, Craig Kauffman began spray-painting sheet acrylic to achieve evenly covered surfaces; he then started vacuum-forming the plastic sheets into three-dimensional works such as Yellow Orange. Although these wall sculptures were produced commercially—by a company whose clients typically included gas stations and doughnut shops—Kauffman painted and finished them himself to achieve his desired level of visual perfection. The vibrant colors of these works were inspired by Jell-O and by soda he had seen bubbling in machines in a restaurant near his apartment..

Exhibition label: Light, Space, Surface: Works from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 2021, Carol S. Eliel.