Page 31 - Studio International - August 1966

'They have all won, and so they must all would have been folly to presume that we realist poetry of Newsome's images, the
have prizes'—to be exact, six prizes out of knew what was best for them. So question echoes of Kandinsky and Lissitszky in
thirteen invited entrants. The problem of of this 'moral' type—'Will it do him good?' Cina's floating biomorphic forms, the very
judging a competition like the Peter —receded into the background and, as it intriguing imagery of process, time-
Stuyvesant scholarships lies, to no small happened, the selection of scholarship sequence, stress and proportional theory
degree, in the kind of criteria that you, as winners was almost entirely done (and which Carter employed. Hosking's
judge, are expected to use. The Stuyvesant with surprising unanimity) on the basis of monumental folded slabs, Gadsby's spec-
awards are not, repeat not, an art prize the quality of the paintings themselves. trum passages of light, and Cook's a large,
pure and simple. The best painting does The trouble was that we ran out of delicately painted and mysterious
not necessarily win. The judges were scholarships: the field was very even in assemblies of different-sized canvases.
invited to consider other factors too: for quality, and to divide it, as if between It was not thought necessary, or even
instance, the hypothetical potential of the sheep and goats, was in some measure to desirable, that either the entrants or the
painters, the possible effect of the distort both it and our reactions to it. eventual winners should form a unified
American scene on their work, whether The winners were (in alphabetical order): bloc, a kind of 'English Young Painters'
or not the man under consideration had John Carter, Colin Cina, Roger Cook, Style' for 1967; art scholarships are not
been to the States already (this, by the way, Eric Gadsby, Knighton Hosking, and meant to set trends, and, in fact, it would
was not treated as a disability), and so Victor Newsome. Of these, Cook and be a distortion to suppose that the work
forth. These criteria, if too much stress Newsome had exhibited before, at Rowan of any young painter is likely to be other
had been put on them, would have forced and Grabowski respectively; the rest were than one phase, soon to be changed, in a
the judges into the distasteful roles of either art students or unknown. They long development. So there is nothing
God or Nostradamus. Since nearly all the represented a wide spectrum of style, definitive about the Stuyvesant Awards;
candidates were new to the judges, it ideas, and sources: the menacing, sur- no 'situation' congeals around them.
q

John Carter Scatola 1966
Roger Cook Ganda1ph 1966
PVA on wood and hardboard 54 x 51 x 12+ in. Acrylic on canvas 80 x 60 in.
Courtesy: Rowan Gallery