Page 51 - Studio International - April 1966

himself; but there is a curious sense of shared obsessions, citrant medium than ink, at least where this kind of art
as if the very time and place entered into Kafka's dream, is concerned.
and Kubin's also. At the WADDINGTON GALLERY is a show of sculpture by
I have saved till last, three events which are perhaps David Annesley, who also puts great stress on simplicity.
among the most interesting of the month. One is the fine Annesley has refined and strengthened his ideas since he
show of work covering the past fifteen or so years by appeared in that galaxy of talent at the WHITECHAPEL. He
Miro at the MARLBOROUGH GALLERY. Miro is SO much is here concerned with the notion of shapes that 'rhyme'
among the classics of modern art that it's hard to find together. The chosen material is strips of metal, bent and
anything fresh to say about his work, especially as it has painted. This is sculpture which has lost all concern with
always been peculiarly resistant to commentary. The bulk, and even (now) with space occupied. It's purely the
pictures at the MARLBOROUGH are very much the mixture tension of the metal band which does the work—this, and
as before—simple signs and emblems, little runes and its response to an opposing tension. It's a kind of art which
gesticulating figures, a cunning use of texture (see the cuts deep.
paintings on hessian), a ravishing sense of colour. What Finally, art for export. Before it left for Holland I saw
is mysterious about Miro is the authority with which he the exhibition of graphic work by David Hockney which
invests these elements. Three lines will 'hold' the picture will be at the STEDILIJK MUSEUM for April and part of
Right
David Annesley space in a most astonishing way, yet each of these lines, May. The prints are mostly familiar—such things as The
Untitled when one looks, is feeble, bent, broken-backed as a piece Rake's Progress and the series called A Hollywood Art Collec-
Painted aluminium
Waddington Gallery of dropped string. Lyricism is the most difficult of all tion which figured in his recent one-man show. The draw-
qualities to analyse—Miro often seems to me to paint ings done over the past two or three years are extremely
Below precisely as a bird sings. Yet one also feels the presence various. They are also quite stunningly inventive. Few
Joan Miro Peinture 1953 of an intense concentration. There is only one parallel people think of Hockney as a painter of landscape, but
49+ x 96+ in.
Oil on canvas I can think of—the 'thrown-ink' paintings of the Chinese among the most interesting things here are a number of
Marlborough Gallery and Japanese Zen masters. But oil-paint is a more recal- drawings without figures. The ability to seize the essential

elements of the scene and to render them as a totally un-
expected kind of pattern is what pleases me most. One
drawing, for example, seems influenced by Japanese art—
heavy bands of cloud coil over a curving dune. Another
shows the abrupt mountains of the Lebanon, with the
highway driving arrow-straight towards them over the
plain. There are other drawings still, from Los Angeles
and Egypt. Hockney gets around, it seems. So, too, does
his work. Two concurrent shows (one of painting, one of
graphics) have just closed in Milan, and there was
recently one in Brussels.
q
David Hockney
Shell Garage 1963
Pencil and crayon
Private collection, London