Page 78 - Studio International - May 1974

texturally rich, often incorporated new areas of his visual experience.
natural objects — e.g., shells, bark and Mladejovsky's most resolved
fur—as a part of their composition. painting, New Year of 1974. is made
The arrangement of these elements by placing two canvases, as it were,
was both surreal and evocative and, face to face. Then one canvas is
in general, they were representational cut into flaccid yet taut shapes which
and inspired by personal memories. suggest leaves caught by movements
Two themes regulate Mladejovsky's of wind, or the growth of plant life.
recent painting : rhythm and growth. These spontaneous gestures,
These themes are explored in various however, are less abstractions of
ways and the relative success of an individual shapes than elements
image depended on the degree to within a process. They expand and
which the individual elements of the contract, forcing their energy into
configuration could yield a decided realization.
integration. The integration needed The improvised cuttings also serve
was not something highly contained, Mladejovsky's purpose in giving his
since the elements employed were lyricism an additional coherence, since
not emphatically deliberate, but the downward pull of the cut shapes
rather a poised completion, a suggests a gravity in opposition to the
sensitive adjustment, of a variety of prevailing lyricism of the colour. For
rhythmic interactions. Insofar as the the colour seems to unfold, to
energy formed by these interactions blossom outwards. Within the cut
can be described as organic —that is, areas they are bright red and yellow,
related to natural processes—this and the overhanging shapes are
suggests a continuity and freedom colder in hue. The surface, a uniform
within the energy itself rather than blue-grey, mediates and resolves the
Spencer Gore The Back Gardens, The Back Gardens from 2 Houghton
2 Houghton Place 1913
Oil on canvas, 24 x 26in. Place, so that the rectangular houses
are seen in depth forming an
1914 at the age of thirty-seven, but interlocking structure of verticals and
the late paintings in this exhibition diagonals. Not all the paintings are so
showed that his arrangement of form ambitious, however. A naturalistic
and colour was becoming increasingly vase of daisies and cornflowers is
coherent and strongly organized. carried out with the kind of careless
Although he later renounced the spontaneity often found in Vanessa
neo-impressionist method of Bell's work. The Portrait of his Wife of
working, saying 'it was not a great 1913 is also strongly evocative of
success because it made a painting Bloomsbury, not only because of the
very mechanical', it is true that his shapeless blue gown and heavy
handling of the early spun-sugar fringe but also in his Roger Fry type
scenes of the Alhambra theatre treatment of the planes of her face.
clearly reveals the influence of His curious amalgam of Bloomsbury
Lucien Pissarro. Unlike Sickert, who and the Fauves is most marked in
penetrates behind the scenes and The Beanery, in which the brilliant
conveys the grimy vitality of the simplification of landscape forms is
performers, Gore remains firmly in the resolved in the foreground into a
stalls and recreates the spangled decorative design reminiscent of an
spectacle with semi-pointillist Omega carpet. Perhaps the most
precision. The same kind of chalky memorable painting was the Self
brilliance of colour is found in his Portrait. Although the fauvist
early plein-air scenes. Pictures such belligerence of Derain has been
as Tennis, Hertingfordbury inject a modified by British temperance, it is
rare shaft of sunlight into British nevertheless considerably bolder
painting of the period, at the same colouristically than most of the
time perfectly evoking the somnolence 'avant-garde' art of the time. Painted in
of an Edwardian summer. His 1913, the year before he died, it is
enjoyment of a sparkling surface a haunting image of a talented
was gradually replaced by a growing Edwardian, whose work was spiked
preoccupation with form and design. with sufficient fauvist passion to
Matisse, Gauguin and Cezanne were make it something special in England
all included in Roger Fry's famous at the time.
exhibitions at the Grafton Galleries, Fenella Crichton
but although Gore certainly felt their
impact it should not be exaggerated. Jan Mladejovsky at the Grabowski Jan MladejovskySnowball 1973 colour interactions and rhythms.
Oil on canvas, 152 x 195 cm.
He may have dabbled in the Gallery, London, 5-29 March. Drawn from behind, the colours give
swirling waters of Post-impressionism Jan Mladejovsky's recent exhibition its assertive, concentrated impact. A rise to a number of inflections : bands
but he did not jump in at the deep of paintings and prints, dating from number of works fall short of of vermilion-red and hues of violet
end. There is however a notably 1970, at the Grabowski Gallery marked complete integration, but the most and blue are released with fluctuating
bolder and more exploratory use of a clearly defined period in his recent possess a finely poised resonance and absorbing yet
colour in much of his work after 1910. development. Mladejovsky was born resolution. controlled evocative power.
In Outbuildings, Hertingfordbury of in Prague in 1946 and studied at the It is clear from them that Perceptions of rhythm of growth,
1911, the studied sweetness of his Prague School of Art between 1961-5 Mladejovsky has attained a deep of undulation, combine to form a
early soft pinks and leafy greens is and Prague Academy of Applied Art insight into his organizing richly suggestive image. The
replaced by a vibrant emerald and between 1965-8. Arriving in England perceptions during the last four years. perceptions of nature which play a
magenta. At the same time the in 1968, he continued to paint at The colour exploration decided upon large part in Mladejovsky's work
buildings have massed into solid the Slade School of Art. Since 1972 seems right, for a greater intensity of derive from his past experiences
shapes which are coherently ranged he has lectured in print-making at colour would have made the images of the countryside surrounding
across the picture plane. By 1913 he the Croydon College of Art and crude and assertive. Mladejovsky, in Prague. A number of his paintings
has adopted the high viewpoint often Design. avoiding this possible seduction, has relate to this experience, especially
used by Vlaminck and Derain in His earlier work, which was created subtle images which open to the change in the landscape