Page 40 - Studio International - January 1972

UK commentary

JEREMY MOON AT THE ROWAN GALLERY
4 NOVEMBER-2 DECEMBER
FRANK STELLA AT THE KASMIN GALLERY
27 OCTOBER-27 NOVEMBER
TERRY FROST AT THE WADDINGTON GALLERY
3 NOVEMBER-27 NOVEMBER

All histories of art are in some way histories of
ambition; and the best art is usually the most
ambitious. Such ambition, however, belongs
both to style and to method-and stylistic ambi-
tion alone has never been a guarantee of
excellence. Although most major art advances
style through its quality, the issue for any artist
has always been to localize ambition to the
specifics of a particular situation-one painting,
one sculpture-rather than have some 'idea' of
ambition which is then realized through the
medium used. This localizing of ambition is in
essence a critical activity-that is, it demands
that close attention be paid to the results of
painting, that the artist will take no stand other
than for the work at hand. It may seem like a
pathetic fallacy, but for the artist the real
question is always 'What does the work demand?'
rather than 'What do I demand of it ?' Even
more than critics, artists require the ability of
close looking-of a rigorous inwardness to art-
for only through such self-criticism-and a
willingness to take heed of it-can ambition be
thus tested. And if I suggest that the artists I
discuss here-Frank Stella, Jeremy Moon,
Terry Frost-have missed out on excellence in
their recent work it will be mainly because of a
failure in their criticism. Their seriousness and
ambition is not in question. What is, however,
is their real attention to the look of their paint-
ings. In different ways, they all seem to have
suspended their judgements on their own work,
leaving the looking to others.
Frank Stella's new pictures, at KASMIN, are at
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first sight very bewildering. They seem to be
weak, but Stella's reputation is such that one
begins to doubt one's own judgement-and
begins to search for good reasons why the
pictures are as they are. In time, some emerge
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as better than others : the simpler ones, Rakow II
and Borgoria I, come to look more acceptable than
the confusions of Felsztyn IV and Chodoron IV
-but this seems a matter of degree more than
anything else. All of the paintings suffer from a
basic imprecision of direction : clearly there are
links with his earlier work (Chodoron IV looks
back to the 1967 Effingham paintings), but
Stella's new move gives the appearance of being Frank Stella illus. 1-5
overmuch theoretical rather than practical. He Rakow II 1971 93 x 109 in.
had been involved with protractor forms since 2 Borgoria I 1971 90 x 110 in.
1967 and any change, one feels, had to be a 3 Felsztyn IV 1971 io6 X 92 in.
radical one to carry conviction. But surrendering 4 Odelsk IV 1971 90 x 129 in.
to a radical look-as I believe he has done-is no 5 Chodoron IV 1971 I I0 X 103 in.
real answer, and speaks of desperation more Jeremy Moon illus. 6-8
than anything else. 6 No. 6/71 Lake 1971 834 x 126 in.
I have written elsewhere that Stella's new 7 No. 3/71 Christmas 1971 6o x 84 in.
work might be understood in terms of a 8 Sun, Sand & Sea No. 17/70 1970 86 X 114 In.

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