Page 100 - Studio International - July August 1975

Martin Naylor. Three views of Scabbard 4, 1975. Plyboard, wood, paint, ink and varnish, 7 ft x 1 ft 6¾ in x 6 ft 10 in.

acknowledge the transcendental other a projecting horizontal and content. Five of his recent tyranny or by the right as evil
nature of physical materials - to key-shape which contradicted 'Photo-works' (more accurately terrorists subverting democracy.
search for what was intrinsic to the downward thrust of the 'Photo/text-works') were shown Having illustrated the relativism
each substance. They had a way board's outer edge. The work at Greenwood's: 1 (1974), of vision which is such a major
of implying that art could be balanced compact, ponderous Who? What? Why? (1974), source of conflict in human
discovered in the environment strength with a delicate poise, Look on the bright side (1974), society, Stezaker shows in
(only by artists). They objected the form accented by the slight End (1974-5), and Subject - succeeding panels how such
particularly to the traditional bow of the board when seen object 2 (1975); (the first three events attain news value and how
condition that art had to be frontally. In addition the works were illustrated and they achieve reality by being
judged within its own calligraphy was more subtle than described in the March/April reported. He then links the
hierarchy, as things made to be in the other works, and the issue of STUDIO INTERNATIONAL). analysis of news reportage to
seen and thus divorced from the simple beauty of variations of Among the photographic material philosophical problems
mundane mass of casual matte and gloss strokes became in these works are images drawn concerning reason, means and
artifacts. gradually apparent. from advertising, films, ends, historical determinism
Naylor's work was never so The latest drawings under the newspapers, Pop art (Warhol's and ideology.
blatant nor condescending as the Fortress label contained a number Elvis), Chinese propaganda, Although the physical form of
American version of Post- of very sculptural inventions. Superman comics, soft-core presentation of content is always
Minimalism, but it was flavoured In the initial stages of this series pornography, and among the a secondary consideration in the
with an authoritarianism, the artist had worked in rows of textual material are quotations priority ordering of Stezaker's art
presuming the viewer should try tidy, solid bundles, each filled from the writings of sociologists this does not mean that it is
to understand a work regardless with overlapping layers of and philosophers (in particular treated summarily. On the
of whether he was excited by its coloured washes that were Marx and Engels) and from the contrary, images, texts, and
presence or properly familiar with secured by crosses drawn on the love stories of pulp magazines. sculptural devices (3D extensions
its meaning. Typical even of the top. Gradually the solids Clearly this material is extremely mounted at right angles to the
best pieces, such as Obligatory sprouted wiry mobiles, polo fashionable and could, in other wall) are organized in a highly
Inquest/Place shown in 1972 at stick configurations and other hands, have fallen into the error sophisticated manner:
the Royal Academy, was the connotative but unclassifiable of radical chic. What is remarkable connotative meanings are
labyrinth of attachments, images. Many of the marks about these five Photo-works is the suggested by the grouping of
fastidiously ordered to be 'read' described three-dimensional way in which Stezaker combines images on separate panels and by
in a given sequence. concerns; for example depending vulgar or horrific images with the insertion of colour
A consistent factor in his work on where the shadow fell next philosophical statements to photographs at strategic points
has been the exploitation of certain to a thick `7' shape it could either demonstrate conclusively that the within a linear sequence of black
very personal devices for be seen as an object fixed to a abstract problems of philosophy and white photographs; the
creating nervous tension and his plane or one hurtling into space. are the concrete problems of meaning of textual elements is
excellent use of shadow. There is The technique of these everyday life. The works clarified by the use of a colour
an acute black-angle shape as expressionistic drawings was continually pose the questions coding system; logical
common in Naylor's vocabulary occasionally quite crude Who? What? Why?, questions connections between the various
as ray guns in Oldenburg's. (compared to Gorky, Giacometti, of existence, politics and items of the display are established
The points of these quirky shapes etc.) but they made up for their ideology. In Subject - Object 2 by the use of diagrammatic
convey romantic visions of lack of tonal finesse by their a man spanks the bottoms of two layouts and by the interplay of
sword tips, animal ears and other inventiveness and indeed their female employees; the text diachronic and synchronic
piercing and pointing talismans. humour. Within Fortress 8 was beneath these pornographic patterns of images; and the
In the recent works they were an odd thing like a gull on one images suggests that under oppositional character of the
both projected into space (and leg, whereas in others there capitalism interpersonal moral conclusions to the
on to the wall) and drawn in abounded both vibrating springs relationships are dictated by preceding narrative flows is
crayon slipping silently between and soft cushions. modes of production and that the signified by the abrupt change of
the narrow crevices separating Catherine Lampert relationship between subject and direction of the sculptural
panels from the main boards. object is only comprehensible in projections. If Stezaker's
Arguably the strongest piece terms of the relation between interests were purely formal his
in the last show was the one not John Stezaker consumer and product, and as a work could be categorized as
made in a short space of time. result of the alienation this `Semiotic art' because it depends
This was the work, Fortress 3, Nigel Greenwood's, produces, individuals are driven upon a conscious manipulation
that had been isolated at the end 8 May-1 June to establish alien powers over of the coding and structuring
of the gallery and cleverly lit so others to satisfy their selfish devices which are the subject
that a daylight beam brought out Having completed his analysis needs. matter of the science of signs.
the blue, green and brown tones of Modernism and having Perhaps the most ambitious The fact that Stezaker employs
embedded into the overall black developed an alternative work is End. It begins with a mixture of media indicates his
paint. Nailed directly on to the theoretical/practical basis for the images of gunmen fighting indifference to the purity of
sides of this 12 ft panel were production of artworks, Stezaker authority, images which can be medium fetishism of modernist
wooden flaps; on the right side a has now turned all his attention interpreted by the left as brave painting theory.
stabilizing triangle and on the to the problem of subject matter revolutionaries opposing In recent years photographic
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