Photos By Gail

I’m a longtime fan of Paul Thek, particularly his famous wax meat sculptures, which remain some of the most unsettling and fascinating artworks of the 1960s. While exploring his work recently, I was captivated by a very different piece: Untitled (Hand with Ring) (1967), a colorful sculpture of a human hand encased inside a clear Plexiglas vitrine.

The work is part of Thek’s renowned Technological Reliquaries series, a body of work that helped establish him as one of the most original artists of his generation. At first glance, the hand appears almost archaeological, as though it has been unearthed from another time. Its surface is covered in layers of pink, blue, green, yellow, and silver, creating the appearance of peeling paint, weathered skin, or a treasured object transformed by age. A simple green ring adorns one finger, adding an unexpected touch of personality and mystery.

Thek created many of his reliquary works after being inspired by religious shrines and catacombs, where fragments of human remains are preserved and displayed as sacred objects. Here, the hand is isolated from the rest of the body and presented like a precious relic. The pristine Plexiglas case protects it while simultaneously creating a sense of distance, turning something deeply human into an object for contemplation. What I find most compelling is the gesture itself. The hand seems poised between a greeting and a farewell, as though it is waving hello and goodbye at the same time.

The sculpture becomes a meditation on memory, mortality, and the traces we leave behind. Though modest in scale, Untitled (Hand with Ring) commands attention. It feels less like a sculpture and more like a preserved memory — a fragment of a person suspended between presence and disappearance. Nearly sixty years after it was created, Paul Thek’s mysterious hand continues to reach across time and invite us to wonder about the story it has to tell.

Photographed at Pace Gallery in New York City as part of the exhibition Dream of Vanishing, which Runs Through August 14, 2006.