Page 58 - Studio International - March 1972

`I had originally planned to add extensive cultural events, and in a quantity of words which Girouard often refers. And the book's
footnotes to each essay in which I would argue produced fast enough to pay the rent. Abstaining arrangement results, in some cases, in some
with myself on points concerning which I from teaching and museum work, she can important houses appearing in the introduction,
have changed my mind, but my complaints `bemoan the rapid pace forced upon a free-lance where they are inadequately illustrated or have
were too broad and I was too lazy to follow critic' (p. 12); but to extend sympathy for the no plans. There are also a number of errors in
through. And some of the issues I was then pressures she undergoes to accepting their references and plate numbers.
involved in now seem so irrelevant that they determination by force of what she does would These, however, are niggling criticisms, for
are better ignored than prolonged.' (p. 15). be demeaning to Lucy Lippard or any other Girouard handles the mass of detail and
After this apallingly, honestly damning self- human being. By her own artistic criteria and illustration with masterly skill. What comes
indictment, I am amazed that yet she published articulated intentions, Changing is not a work of through is a lively and original assessment of a
the book, and I have read it, and am reviewing it. art, or criticism of art criticism; it is an unique building type which proved to be an
Why ? She gives her interpretation in her excellent example of the craft of art criticism as architectural dinosaur. The Victorian country
`Prefatory Notes' : practised in the 196os in New York by an houses were brought into being by a
`If there is a connecting thread in the extremely intelligent and independent critic combination of social and economic factors
contents of this book it is the relationship thoroughly involved with the artists' art world. which were relatively short-lived. Most of the
between the internal and external change, my And if she had not been so honest in presenting clients were the industrialists or financiers
own seeing/thinking process and that of the her creative intentions, so intelligently newly enriched by the industrial revolution,
art about which I write. The only reason to provocative in her writings, and so concerned although a substantial minority consisted of
reprint these texts is in order to expose that with the relation between being an artist and the old landed gentry whose fortunes had been
flux, to read them again in a broader context, being a critic, this character of Changing would enhanced by the development of minerals on
and to see how clearly, if at all, certain not be such a disappointment. their lands or the expansion of the industrial
constant preoccupations ... survive the BARBARA REISE towns. The possession of a landed estate with a
changes.' (p.11). great house was not only a symbol of social
If only she had taken the time, exercised the How nobly they fall success, but was also (until the collapse of
difficulty and directness required by the terms The Victorian Country House by Mark agricultural prices) considered to be the soundest
of her original plan ! The book could have been Girouard. 218 pp with 42o illustrations. possible investment. The construction of the
a real work of art: manifesting changing rather Clarendon Press, Oxford. £12. railways made possible the assembly of large
than just propounding it, and revolutionizing house parties of guests, with their attendant
the old-artcritics' syndrome of hiding original Those who specialize, as architectural critics, retinues of servants, for weekends or for longer
publications behind smoothed-out 'up-dated' in the field of country houses, are bound to be periods. The population explosion and the
collections. Even without the argumentative suspected of snobbery. It is one of the many contraction of rural industry created a vast
footnotes the book could have manifested the virtues of Mark Girouard that he is neither pool of labour which made it possible to run
flux of her mind with more of the 'clarity, mesmerized nor seduced by money or title. His houses which were, to use the modern phrase,
directness, honesty, lack of pretence and concern is to relate an extraordinary architectural fantastically labour intensive. Not only did they
prettiness, even a kind of awkwardness' which phenomenon, the Victorian country house, to the require very large staffs to run them, but
she says she describes as her artistic criteria social, political and economic conditions which building maintenance was so cheap (at least in
`when cornered' (p. 12) —if she had at least listed gave rise to it. He penetrates through the visual proportion to the means of the proprietors)
everything she wrote and presented the reprinted aspects of the architecture, of which he has the that architectural fantasy could be allowed to
texts in their original chronological order. But keenest perception, to the social life and class run riot without much thought for the cost of
although she mentions some essays omitted, she structure which it embodied. maintaining the exciting but extravagant roof
ignores many less respectable ones completely; The author's obvious difficulty in organizing lines or other features by which some of the
she has done some editing (described as 'a his material was that if he wrote a history of the most striking architectural effects were
minimum' rather fully on p. 15); and worst, she period he was in danger of failing to describe achieved. Even when, as was the case
has composed a sequence for the texts which the more important houses properly; while, if surprisingly often, the houses incorporated the
relates less to the chronological changes of her he described each of the key houses separately, most advanced technology of the time (central
own mind than to a sort of art-historical the main lessons of his analysis would be heating, lifts, modern plumbing, electric light,
development in their `content'— heralded by the swamped in detail. He has solved the problem gas and so on), a small army of servants was
essay on criticism (fourteenth in chronology of very well by dividing the book into two main still required.
original publication), followed by the 'historical' parts. The first is a comprehensive The buildings, whatever their planning or
art and 'progressing' erratically to the introduction which analyses the studies he has architectural style, developed into vast,
structurally-interesting absent-information made of some 500 large country houses built overgrown, highly specialized complexes, with
critique of the 1970 supermarket 'conceptual between 1840 and 1890. The second contains over-extended communications that reflected
art' exhibition of 'Information'. This sort of individual studies of twenty-nine houses. Each an elaborate structure of class, social and
manipulation into thematic coherence makes the part is illustrated, with more than 400 sexual relations that was already on its way out
articulated intentions seem just a bit of photographs and 3o drawings. The whole is before the end of the century. The photographs
intellectual decoration on a self-protective rounded off with a catalogue of the houses illustrate the architectural skin and the internal
composition. As a work separate from its varied studied, notes on the architects, two indices form and decoration, but the plans reveal the
original contexts, the book seems neither fish (one would have been better) and maps giving intricate, and often extremely skilful, way in
nor fowl so much as a conceptually fancy pot- the location of each house and their division which the architects contrived to organize
boiler. between old and new families (but not, country house life. If ever there was a time
Which brings me back to the thread which I regretfully, whether the houses still exist or can when buildings were tailored precisely to
find most depressingly un-changed throughout be visited). The text is delightfully readable, function, this was it, with a room for every
the book: the awareness that this is a informative, witty and wholly free from jargon service function and the accommodation
`professional' at work, writing primarily in or obscurity. The plans are all to the same scale, organized to achieve the appropriate relation,
(reviewing) response to what the art world and the photographs are first-class. I would or separation, of the domestic functions.
publicizes (in museums, galleries, or magazine have liked even a few colour photographs to Staircases and corridors separated the men
policies), to publishing deadlines related to those illustrate the rich polychromatic effects to from the women (at both master and servant