Page 60 - Studio International - July August 1972
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the invention of oil paint and the use of canvas to think of the hundreds of tombs and memorials the craftsman and is honoured in proportion to
which liberated the painter from the role of produced by Bacon, Chantrey, Flaxman and his capacity to raise an emotional response.
foreman decorator. others that fill the churches of the countryside, The modern movement is, fundamentally,
The development of independent sub- and the equally endless stained glass, to an intellectual attempt to adjust to
contracting workshops for the production of understand the extent of this straightforward technological change. The failure of Ruskin and
components such as those run by Verocchio, professional activity. This system began to Morris in opposing the machine in the
Bernini, Tiepolo, Rubens etc. provided a change under the influence of the modern nineteenth century suggested that the correct
mechanism by which large scale decorations movement, when 'decoration' became a dirty reaction should be to welcome and accept
could be undertaken and such organizations word and the artist was finally freed from any technology, that if the machine could be made a
were responsible for most art production until relation whatsoever with construction work. servant rather than a master, a very much higher
the end of the nineteenth century. One has only He now approximates to the poet rather than civilization might arise.
Seventy years on we are still unsure if this
now universal attitude was correct, but it is
probably too late to do much about it. In
architecture the result of the philosophy was
to progressively simplify all the elements and
eliminate the inessentials. Among the latter
were previously accepted languages or styles
as well as the traditional structural
methodologies. The new language was, and is,
inevitably elementary, a kind of architectural
baby talk. Planning proposals resemble nursery
games of a particularly basic kind.
Something similar has happened to art, as
the complexity of formal and iconological
reference was abandoned first for quasi-
scientific research (Impressionism, Pointilism,
Cubism, Constructivism, or Kinetics) for the
expression of private emotion (Expressionism)
or experience (Surrealism). These movements
have gradually lost their validity, perhaps
because they have little relation to actuality. The
art object has become progressively simpler and
elementary. Art has also become less meaningful
in relation to the mass of the public and is
accepted as an inevitably and essentially private
occupation.
As the nature of the builder's material has
changed so has that of the sculptor. Sculptors'
works, like the builders, are in many ways
dictated by economic and technical
considerations. It is now economically suicidal
to carve stone (because of the time involved
and the high cost of assistants) so that alternative
materials with simpler procedures (such as
welding) or with possibilities of replication
(glass-fibre) have been explored. Conceptual art
provides a natural conclusion to a seventy year
search for an inexpensive sculptural
methodology.
The process by which technology is
detaching architecture from architects (by the
ordering of components into ever larger systems
which do not require much skill to coordinate
and whose design process consists of a few
elementary choices) works also against the
sculptor who attempts to work in the materials
(Left)
Willowbrook Estate, Camberwell
End wall by Mitchell
(Top right)
Henry Moore
Knife Edge Two Piece 1962-5
Bronze, 12 ft long. Edition of 3
(Bottom right)
Sculptures by Tinguely and Niki de St Phalle
French Pavilion, EXPO 67
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