Page 32 - Studio International - May 1972

but if we go back to the duality between the
202
—the idea of an object as a final result—as some
system and the object it may well be that the sort of marketable commodity isn't the aim, it
object is very complex—it doesn't follow that is the qualities and relationships within the
the simplicity of the system, the naivety of the object... There is that little thing that Albers
system, implies the naivety of the end product said—`Art is not objects but experience', and
—the object. that's the sort of emphasis. I feel so often when
GEOFFREY SMEDLEY : In broad terms it is the criticisms are made—where they are looking at
whole 'mind-matter relationship', isn't it ? the it with the wrong emphasis.
Stokes 'thingness or otherness'— this is the
important thing isn't it, the two things JEFFREY STEELE : If we could come back to
together. something which was left a little bit undefined
MALCOLM HUGHES : It becomes, if one can —which was the recoverability principle...
define the end product—it becomes something there was a tentative agreement... in this group,
—a 'new totality', not separated out into two that the work, whatever it is ... should contain
elements—the mental and the physical—it enough information to define the system that
becomes something which is new. Something generated it.
new happens in terms of relationships between DAVE SAUNDERS : Does this exclude the use of
these two entities. chance ? I am thinking of the works I did
using the I Ching as a generator—which are
MALCOLM HUGHES : ... The necessity of having absolutely rigorous—no taste decisions are
objects—there is a climate of opinion that says made after the original intuiting of the system
that the object, as such, is no longer necessary— —the fact remains that using the I Ching as a
or even is something that gets in between, or in generator is bringing in chance ... I am
the way of the realization of what the conceptual wondering if, in that case all the information
side is. about the work can be deduced from the work.
COLIN JONES : ... as far as I am concerned, I am JEFFREY STEELE : In that case you would get back
interested in the potentiality of visual to your hexagram and that's where the
properties and cannot explore that kind of recovering process stops ... but it can't tell you
thing in a purely conceptual way because you how you arrived at the hexagram.
are dealing with light, volume, space, PETER LOWE : But the thing is that you can work
movement—these kinds of physical energies— intuitively with the system. I think what
one can only deal with them in a physical way— scares people is that they think it rules out
and although the process may include analysis intuition ... you have choice ... one can always
ultimately one is concerned with physical make a choice. And the choice that you make
properties.... But, isn't the assumption needn't always be a rational one—or one that
sometimes made that the sort of art we are you can explain why you made that choice—as
involved in, is just the making of objects—now opposed to another ... it's your personality ...
I am not really interested in making objects it's the irrational element ...and this is not
6, 7, 8, 9, to
Installation in progress of piece by
David Saunders Untitled 1971/2
Gillian Wise Ciobotaru
a. Reflexion/Connexions 1972
28 x 84 x 84 in.
b. Reflexion 1972
54x 40 in.
12 Michael Kidner
Systems Project 1971/2
Column 84 x r6 x r6 in.
Painting 84 x 126 in.
13 Malcolm Hughes
Four White Reliefs
Jeffrey Steele Abakum 1972
14 Malcolm Hughes
Four White Reliefs
Geoffrey Smedley Proposition
15 Richard Allen
Systems Project 1971/2.
Photos 11-15 Corry Bevington