World Chess Hall of Fame Presents: Tom Hackney Exhibit

On Thursday, May 20th, 2016 The World Chess Hall of Fame debuted an exhibition of paintings by ​Tom Hackney: Corresponding Squares: Painting the Chess Games of Marcel Duchamp. Most recently on view at Francis M. Naumann Fine Art in New York this exhibit represents the British painter’s first solo show in the U.S.

Guests were treated to Hors d ‘Ouevres and drinks while viewing the paintings with Introductions by Shannon Bailey, chief curator for the museum and Tom Hackney gave his thoughts on his work and then mingled with the guests the rest of the evening.

Hackney’s paintings, all created on linen, are geometric abstractions based on the movement of chess pieces in games played by the celebrated French artist and chess player, Marcel Duchamp, from the early 1920s through the 1960s. Duchamp once said that playing a game of chess was like making a drawing: “The chess pieces are the block alphabet which shapes thoughts, and these thoughts, although making a visual design on the chessboard, express their beauty abstractly, like a poem.”
Hackney’s art represents this visual design in a single static image. It was Duchamp’s goal to elevate art from a purely visual experience to something more cerebral, an aspiration that Hackney accomplishes in these paintings, which are influenced by ideas that took place on the 64 squares of a chessboard.
The exhibition’s title is a subtle allusion to the book on endgame strategy, ​Opposition and Sister Squares Reconciled,​that Duchamp wrote in 1932 with Russian­born chess master Vitaly Halberstadt.

The World Chess Hall of Fame opened September 9, 2011, in Saint Louis’ bustling Central West End neighborhood, directly across the street from the CCSCSL.The WCHOF is housed in a historic 15,900 square-foot residence-turned-business and features the U.S. and World Chess Halls of Fame, displays of artifacts from the permanent collection, and temporary exhibitions highlighting the great players, historic games, and cultural and artistic impact of chess. The WCHOF partners with the CCSCSL to provide innovative
programming and outreach to local, national, and international audiences. In September 2016, the WCHOF celebrates its fifth anniversary.

For more information visit: http://www.worldchesshof.org