Page 101 - Studio International - November December 1975

Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol
objective description, though that comes into it, an The annotated Ordnance Survey Maps that he showed
account of experience rather than the creation and were interesting as diagrams, clearly setting out the
presentation of its image and equivalent. Such work is patterns of his private and obsessive boundary-beatings
useful, and has freed artists from certain obligations and in various parts of the countryside. But the circles and
restraints, should they wish to be so free : and canvas and squares so assiduously traced, and so painfully followed
sculpture may be abandoned in favour of the material on the ground, were remarkable only for the
landscape itself. The emphasis naturally shifts towards perseverance with which Long carried out his self-
other forms, temporal, ritual perhaps, often diagrammatic imposed and self-important task. His plain photographs,
and rather literary, all ¾ shade disconcerting to those who of Irish and Canadian landscapes, were very good,
want their Art to come neatly boxed and labelled. But the images that are trusted to establish themselves in their
genre is serious and authentic. own terms.
There are several occupational traps, however, the Marie Yates showed one work, Dorset Field Working.
most dangerous ¾ creeping and domineering It consisted of one coloured photograph augmented by
egocentricity, that may well come between the viewer twenty-eight printed statements of the same size
and his legitimate and autonomous experience of the disposed as an extended rectangle across the wall. We
work. Hamish Fulton makes ¾ journey, for example, and, were led into the field by the gate, according to the
through the agency of the works which spring from it, instructions, noting the time of day ; and then on, around
that he puts before us, we may comprehend the art and the outside of the square-cum-field, listening to the birds,
the experience imaginatively, and make them our own. watching the weather and admiring the view. Miss Yates'
Should his presence intrude too much, reducing the four Procedures were simply the parts of her
work to ¾ mere celebration of himself rather than allowing description of her physical response to the experiences
us to get past him to the actual experience, then so much afforded by the circling of the field, ¾ kind of bucolic
is lost. The point is well made with Fulton, who usually Stations of the Cross. It was openly literary, and dealt
achieves this necessary self-effacement. Preciousness effectively with the chosen material ; though the jargon
and self-consciousness are great enemies of art. The of Procedures and Working was unnecessary.
artist pompously assuming the role of ring-master is ¾ Phillippa Encobichon, the youngest exhibitor, also
bore. Here, as in every other field, the most powerful showed only one work, an eminently successful
work is the least specific, making its point elliptically and photographic sequence, fifty-two shots of the same
enigmatically, always saying less than it knows, view from the same spot in the middle of ¾ flat and
allowing us the choice to work or not at sharpening our empty field, with only ¾ few small huts on the horizon.
sensibility. Week by week we were taken through the seasonal cycle
Fulton showed ¾ series of large and very beautiful of growth, harvest and plough, an inexorable progress
photographs that he had taken on his various pilgrimages, emphasized by the temporary intrusions of clouds and
chapter and verse being given in each case. He is ¾ fine birds, farm workers and machinery. It was ¾ work
photographer, good enough to rest his reputation on the dealing with time passing, and had to be read, ¾ year in
work as it is; but the implications imposed on it through five minutes, but the connection held.
the captions, which act as conceptual triggers, take it The Arnolfini's move means that it will have much more
further, and into the realm of sculpture. The suggestion is and better exhibition space, ¾ proper experimental
that by tracing its course, the artist identifies the journey theatre, ¾ book shop and restaurant, besides all the
as ¾ physical entity, ¾ palpable and distinct object, but one administrative convenience that goes with ¾ well-
that may only be understood, never encompassed, never thought-out and detailed establishment. It is something
seen, only felt. And the entire landscape remains to be of ¾ fluke that the move was possible at all ; but ¾
appropriated in this way. The journey itself must be made permanent site became available, and the money, an
however, ¾ ritual act that frees the imagination. enormous sum, was found in time. Contracts were made
Richard Long builds on the same premise, but on the long before the Great Inflation, luckily, for the project
evidence of this exhibition, with rather less success : the would be unthinkable now. Bristol is extremely fortunate
work is more obvious, less critical and less refined. His to have such ¾ major institution in its midst, and that is the
large stone circle, shown at the Hayward Gallery some role it must act now. We need strong satellites to
years ago, was simple, effective and moving, elegantly counteract the pull of London.
marrying the idea of the physical collection of material to The dangers need spelling out, however : big may be
the residuum of cultural associations going back into good, but not always best. A large organisation can so
pre-history, real and poetic. In contrast, the floor-piece at easily strangle itself with its own bureaucracy, and, in
the Arnolfini, a zig-zag arrangement to accommodate the extremis, forget that the Arts, all the Arts, demand
pillars of the building, was arbitrary and decorative, flexibility, spontaneity and freedom in their handling.
justifiable only in terms of his private art-history.
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