Page 60 - Studio International - December 1969

Richard Smith discusses of space and real space has been a constant colours in one box. The choice you make is

his latest work theme with the paintin . I started shaping not one of mixing and then deciding. I used
gs
the canvases so long ago I've almost forgotten
to go on colour shopping expeditions to buy
the reason why, but it has to do with putting new colours. I wanted to buy a colour not
a real depth against an illusory depth and have to make it. Colours have particular
keeping a balance between the two-painting associations for me: I think in terms of animal
RICHARD SMITH'S LATEST SERIES OF PRINT, thin gs out, painting thin gs in. In the paintin gs or vegetable or mineral colours, natural or
PUBLISHED BY THE PETERSBURG PRESS, IS each colour variant is usually on a separate artificial colours. With lithography you get
ENTITLED '16 PIECES OF PAPER'. FOUR SHEETS canvas; this makes an edge equivalent to a cut an evenness of surface. This series is a very
OF COLOURED PAPER ARE THE BASIC UNITS, USED edge. Paper is more manageable than canvas extravagant way of making prints -four pieces
and I like its fragility and its permanence. of paper plus or minus per print, three printin
IN DIFFERENT COMBINATIONS OF CUT AND gs
I sometimes feel I should be working on per piece. I like the idea that every layer of
FOLDED LAYERS, BY MEANS OF WHICH FOUR
enormous pieces of paper. With earlier paint­ paper is the same size. It doesn't register
SEPARATE IMAGES ARE MADE. THE FOLLOWING
in it was impossible to find a drawing visually but one knows it's there. The system
TEXT IS DERIVED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT gs
equivalent-I made paper and balsa models; is not additive as with collage but a paring
OF A DISCUSSION ABOUT THESE PRINTS.
now it's really reversed: the paintin gs tend to away of what is there revealing subsequent
The images in the prints are proscenium be like an equivalent of the drawin . The layers. These are interleaved so finally part
gs
images or doorways with the curtain drawn, drawin gs can happen so quickly, be light­ of the last piece is on top of the first layer. I
the door closed. The four prints have titles hearted or irrational whereas in the paintin gs don't like the fdea of their being glued
which are vaguely theatrical: Interval, Exit, the process is complicated and time-consum­ together.
Prop, etc. I did two before called after Edward ing. The drawings which are most successful I find I get less interested in colour-more
Gordon Craig. These were single sheet prints don't necessarily provide cues for painting, interested in quality of surface in the paintings.
cut and folded. You set up a doorway as but the prints are directly related to the In the drawings I si gn al paper changes by
something to go through, but in the prints the drawin -it's another way of drawing. Hav­ colour changes. Lithography proves a very
gs
space enclosed may actually project forward. ing the papers ready-coloured and alternating suitable way of working in relation to the
I think the theatre is an interesting format; I them is a logical way of working; one's inten­ drawin . I like the idea of making one's own
gs
am· thinking of making a paper theatre-a tions and what happens are very close-it's coloured paper-an equivalent to Matisse
flexible proscenium-based area to 'perform' very direct, where you have these four ele­ having paper painted for him. I have a pro­
the drawin . The proscenium idea has ments you've created to deal with. I made the ject for some prints where I actually use
gs
cropped up quite often in the paintings. I'm choice of colours before I had the images; I different qualities of paper in one print, like
interested in theatre as a kind of 'directed knew the kind of image but not the actual tissue paper and cardboard. Paper is one of
space': it relates technically to my activity as image. The drawings are almost all done in my favourite products. It will be great to shop
a painter. The dialogue between the illusion oil pastel: I like having a choice of forty-eight for it. D

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