Tate St.Ives
Just returned from Cornwall after two visits to the above in two days – to see the same shows, in case I missed anything. Such is my level of dedication.
Lily van der Stokker – “No Big Deal Thing”
Pastel colours, child-like, or more accurately, 70’s hippy- type, childish drawings, brightly coloured sofas, ordinary, everyday things, celebrating the normal. Some huge murals, many drawings on A4 paper. I heard a gallery guide explaining why this was a feminist approach (ordinary women’s world, child- friendly, claiming and celebrating the territory, etc.) The booklet says she “challenges and engages with the legacies of Feminism, exploring ideas often thought of as forbidden to contemporary art – the decorative, the sentimental and the “nice”” . I failed to detect any note of irony in the work, so why the inverted commas for “nice”? I was reminded of Post it notes on fridges, children’s crayon drawings, people who dot “i’s” with smiley faces.
I wondered what, say, Joan Mitchell or Marlene Dumas would have made of it. She has a point really – art can’t all be about dramatic stuff like sex, death, despair, the sublime and so on; that’s mostly for the boys – it should also be about a nice ice cream, or a trip to the petting farm with your daughters.
Object: Gesture: Grid – St.Ives and the International Avant – garde
This is the other exhibition on at the moment and there is some great stuff in it. A ludicrous understatement really; must be about 50 million quids-worth if it ever came on the market.
There are three rooms, the first of which is “Object” – works influenced by Cubism and Surrealism. There’s a Braque, a Picasso, Giacometti, Hepworth and Ernst – but I have to say, although I registered the presence of these, I have no memory of them except the Ernst, which had one of those corrugated, brown, hairy surface areas like a doormat, that he does.
Tunnard
The painting that strikes you first – I watched other punters, most went straight over to it – was by John Tunnard, called “Tol Pedn”. this is a place name, so I suppose it makes this work something like a Lanyon, in that it may be an exploded landscape. it looks nothing like a Lanyon, however; more like a Paul Nash surreal effort. It has sharply defined, red/pink arch things, grey areas, carefully drawn lines – striking.
Mellis
The Margaret Mellis is a blue wooden disc on drift- and scrapwood backing, like a flattened toy handcart; a beachcomber’s “glut”.
William Scott
The Scott is an unadorned and only slightly simpified mackerel, arching across a dish against a black background. Unusually naturalistic for Scott, must be early.
Paolozzi
Lovely, iron oblong ring sculpture, upper “arm” garlanded with odd objects, VERY much like a David Smith.
Elizabeth Frink
With the Tunnard, the most memorable thing in this room; I think its called “Harbinger Bird”. About 2 ft tall, leaning forward on long legs, an indistinct but sinister sort of head.. I think I’ve seen it on a Penguin book, maybe Ted Hughes?
Alfred Wallis
A fine little ship on a creamy sea, otherwise all greys and greens; I liked this much more than I expected, it was very clear, correct and strong.
That’s the first room; “Gesture” tomorrow – don’t miss it, as it includes Pollock, Hoffman, Appel, Rothko…..
10th May 1941 (WIP)
Blackpaint
Tags: alfred Wallis, Edward Paolozzi, Elizabeth Frink, John Tunnard, Lily van der Stokker, Margaret Mellis, Tate St Ives, William Scott
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