Page 80 - Studio International - January February 1975

redundancy. A door knob has peculiarities of the building, so acknowledge the tyranny of the two.The installation was composed
been hung on the wall like a that one fragment was specially rectangle: rather, a straight of twelve relatively small pieces
perverse kind of trophy: it seems constructed to take in a conduit, acceptance of the convenience of in diverse materials; forms or
to have torn with it part of the while the corners were dealt with its four-corners. figures in steel, painted wood,
surface it originally occupied but in a similarly respectful fashion. oak, fibreglass and aluminium.
at the same time it has been Paradoxically, however, the They were in a small upper
severed absolutely from the area piece as a whole was gallery so that the impression of
it is intended to connect. A key characterized by the impression intimacy with the work was
projects pathetically from its that Wentworth had imposed his reinforced.
lock, having been violently will on the space in a thoroughly The head studies of Laing's
twisted so that it is now uncompromising manner. wife Galina seemed particularly
entirely useless: a pane of glass But because of the nature of the fine. The formal reference is
pinions it flush to the surface, project, the full impact of the clearly cubic (not cubistic) with
James Rosenquist
providing an ironic comment on contradiction implied by the Mayfair 1962,48 x 72 in. concave and convex volumes
the pictorial devices of the units, which seemed to be both delineating the proportions of the
cubists. A glass case is also used mass-produced and the result of There is, however, another shape. In Galina II, for example,
as a trapping agent in Fly in the natural accident, was not aspect which has emerged more the combination of exact angles
Face, to prevent a childish immediately evident. This type clearly since the sixties. We are and deep curves confirms the
weapon from fulfilling its of ambiguity is one of the most beginning to realize how very suggestion of attenuation
aggressive mission. But by interesting aspects of Wentworth's exceptional is the American connecting the head and neck of
savagely depriving these objects work but at Art Net it was phenomenon. At the time we the figure to the shoulder.
of their accustomed function, necessarily relegated to a role of accepted that the colours of Surface detail is absent so that
Wentworth endows them with a secondary importance. Pop-art were derived directly only the general contours of the
new and subtle kind of purpose. Furthermore a sequence of from advertising which was form are stressed. Laing's balance
repeated elements is obviously itself the harmless off-shoot of of empty and full space is
not able to maintain a quality of the consumerdom of the effective; the Galina bronzes
compressed tension in quite the twentieth century. Now it is disclose a personality in a
same way as an individual work. easier to see the extent to which classical material through a
While tension is not always a America and Pop-Art (the true classic sense of restraint. Two
requisite component of successful son of America) is actually a works were in fibreglass — another
sculptural activity, it is a factor product of that advertising and Galina figure and Standing
which Wentworth has shown has begun to buy its own image. Buddha. The former is painted
himself capable of manipulating Never before could one have in a very flat, pale green, the
with a high degree of Buddha figure in a metallic red.
sophistication. The show at Colour on plastic, particularly
Felicity Samuel was so close- hard colour, did not seem to
Instalment at Art Net 1974 packed with Duchampian enhance the forms. The bronzes
Plaster (0(15, spring steel, rubber cord
34 x 27 in. individually equivocation that the result was seemed to express greater
exceptionally stimulating, simplicity and character than the
At Art Net this quality of both on a visual and conceptual fibreglass studies. There were also
suppressed energy was level. several works in oak, smooth and
seemingly released in a regiment Fenella Crichton pale toned, with anthropomorphic
of architectural elements, spaced connotations. They have more
with what at first appeared to be JAMES ROSENQUIST curvilinear, less incisive shapes
military precision, down both the At the Mayor Gallery, London, James Rosenquist than other works and are
Smoke 1962,48 x 60 in.
long and short walls. Although the 3 December-18 January. emphatically volumetric.
units were all basically similar It is over a decade since conceived of using the colours that Finally there was an excellent
in format, having been cast from Rosenquist painted the works on the pop-artists used; never before
the same mould, they were show at the Mayor Gallery, a did self-confidence go such a
differentiated in a number of decade which has served to throw long way. Rosenquist Fl 11
ways. The plaster filling in the 'Pop-Art' and 'America' painting was all there, lucid and
central portion had solidified in into clear perspective. thoughtful. It did, though, relate
varying stages of completion, so Pop-Art took high-flown totally to America. Within the
that in almost every case part of verbosity out of culture, took the values of America, in the
the wall behind was left exposed. veneer off and made it 'formica- American landscape, within the
These half-formed 'blind topped'. It was right to say, and projected aura (and what an
windows' became the base for Oldenburg did, 'I am for the art aura!) of America, Rosenquist
hooks, inserted in seemingly of underwear and taxi-cabs. I am work was totally on the mark.
arbitrary fashion, which in turn for the art of ice-cream cones And somehow the neon flashes
supported a slack and pliant dropped on concrete. I am for were so spellbinding, so much
rubber tube. This tubing ran the the majestic art of dog-turds larger than life itself that we used
length of the piece, connecting rising like cathedrals.' Anything to see nothing but America. We
each element with the next in a was allowed except obscuration. thought we felt like America but
series of lackadaisical loops. Life was reflected back to us as it has emerged recently that no-one
Its inertia contrasted strikingly what we saw, and its meaning was feels like America. Things that
with the aggression of the bands in its everyday effect on us. happen 'over there' just couldn't Gerald Laing
of sprung steel which bridged the The stories behind Rosenquist happen elsewhere. Galina 2 1974
gaps above. As might be images at the Mayor Gallery Thus it was that the qualities Bronze, 11 x 10¾ x 8½ in.
expected in a series of aren't important and if anything in Rosenquist painting seemed
repeated elements, the intervals should speak for itself, it's this more widely true than they reclining figure I was pleased to
assumed a particular importance. kind of painting. Sight Seeing is actually were, which is not to say suddenly see on what looked like
In fact the shapes made by the spectacular stuff with great gobs that Rosenquist regularly hits part of the central heating
connecting elements were widely of red to fill-in the letters at the false notes, or that one expects apparatus x just suggesting it
various, serving to relieve the top, sensational battered hot pink him to play God. might have stopped there on its
tedium induced by the identical for the letters in the panel at the Penny Hawkins way to a more elaborate
crumbling edges. The anonymity bottom, and all with the flash of pedestal. Though slight in scale
of the process which had metal from a silver 'ground'. GERALD LAING the figure had sinuous and
produced these austere slabs of Be Beautiful still has its effect At the Arthur Tooth Gallery, elongated proportions. This work
grey plaster, marked with rows with those exceptional colour London, is a plaster mould for a casting in
of perforations, accentuated the conversations that happen in November. bronze.
idiosyncratic way in which the two-a-penny supermarket ads: Gerald Laing's exhibition was Laing's show did not read as a
elements had actually been put dank plastic red with a mauve quite refreshing. There is a major 'statement'; his
together. The way in which that has such a quality of category of sculpture one is meant reputation as a sculptor relies on
sections of relative monotony nothingness that it becomes to think about, or read in work of much larger scale, but
were juxtaposed with areas of a uniquely something. The acute conceptual complicity on the wall, I hadn't the impression these were
high level of incidence, resulted carelessness of the no-choice and there is a category one may miniatures for pieces of grander
in a sequence of satisfactorily aspect in the placing of marks on recognize as three dimensional, proportion in the future. Scale,
quirky visual rhythms. He had canvas is still fascinating. There traditional and rational. Laing's subject and space consistently
taken into account the existing seems to be no positive refusal to work belongs to the latter of the well matched suggested a
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