Judith Lauand: 2013 (published by Abstract Critical) →

Lauand is a celebrated Brazilian Neo-Concrete Artist, one of the early members of the Grupo Ruptura, and the only one who was a woman. This extramural enclave of Concretists was formed after exposure to the work of - amongst others - Max Bill, who in 1950 had visited South America (another notable influence was the Argentine artist and teacher Tomás Maldonado). Although this is a contentious area of who did what and when, it is apparent that exposure to geometric abstract art and design completely transformed the artistic landscape of Brazil and pre-figured the now well-known future generations of Neo- Concretism there.

Early twentieth century Europe had been a fertile ground for such revolutionary ambitions: after a throwing out of the old order during which artists such as Malevich, Kandinsky and Mondrian had squinted at the first light of the new century, practices became codified and ordered, with subsections and splinter groups all trying to make sense of their newly earned freedoms in Art. To see a movement such as this transposed to South America is at first a curious thing. Brazil is a giant of a country and during this "Second Republic" phase, was in a period of great social and political instability; though within a decade they had Niemeyer’s Brasilia. Artists of its avant-garde were beginning by the end of the 1940s to look outward and the exactitudes and certainties of Concretism clearly spoke directly to their painters and poets. Max Bill lit a touch paper.

It wasn’t until 1954 that Lauand, who responded more to Bill’s work than the more stringent look of Van Doesburg, was exposed to concrete art. This is a rare opportunity to see this artist's work as it is her first European Solo show and as it is from this formative period of her career it has added poignancy. “I (Lauand) base myself on elements inherent to painting itself: form, space, colour and movement. I seek to objectify the plastic problem as much as I can. I love synthesis, precision, exact thinking.”

Featuring two dozen works from the 1950s, the exhibition is relatively modest, yet engaging, with some fascinating works. There are works on paper, board or canvas: drawings, gouaches, collages and a few oil paintings.

A visual logic derived from apparent mathematical sources abounds through line, pattern, repetition and sequence. All the works here are uniquely numbered - seemingly part of a systematic cataloguing that throws light upon her driving aesthetic almost as much as the similarities between the works.

The lines tend towards clean arcs when curved, or form interlocking shapes. Patterns move in directions according to predetermined superstructures. Lines describe geometries and surprising angular relationships with neat little shifts of space and almost retina-disturbing configurations. However, in spite of several forward glances to Op Art, we never quite get to it - thankfully. They have none of the flashiness that characterised that movement; these works are quiet and unassuming. More a case of "look at what I've found" rather than "look at what I'm doing.”

Much of the work features centrally placed geometric designs - either of shapes and/or lines. In some works there are lines and shapes that are clearly sections of larger traceable wholes - an obvious structuring device which can be a touch hit or miss. In one work: "Concreto 221, Acervo 204” gouache on paper; the colour is quite similar to a Miro: red, blue, black and golden yellow 'corner' quadrants play a dizzy rhythm off a neutral grey. The floating larger shapes that are described by these corner pieces touch the sides at their points and scatter incident throughout the work. Yet in another vortex-like painting in blue and black - “Untitled” 1955, oil on board; the structure is too heavy handed and more space-cancelling in effect - the space careering headlong into a central vanishing point in an almost cartoon silhouetted configuration.

The Untitled Oil on canvas 1956 featuring a series of coloured bars - a soft red, sky blue and cream at various angles on a black background. It is the most open ended work on show. There is no feeling of a larger structure present and although the work feels contained it raises more possibilities for colour than any other here. Look at what a painter like Bill Perehudoff went on to do with similar means. (I would be curious to see this work alongside a small linear Panting sculpture also.) Lauand said that her use colour is not functional, and that it is the design that matters. Quite, though I am not sure one can be successfully separated from the other. Much of the work is inherently tonal and the paintings tend to be cautious affairs. Several works employed lines which are subtlety coloured, though, which often added a pleasing deftness and delicacy. There are other tantalising glimpses of colour and I left wanting to see more of her use of colour in emphatic ways. Her full maturity as an artist was perhaps reached in the early 60s, so these works feel explorative and at times tentative.

There are many surprises to the designs and their construction. A singular form often being made up of component sections aiming to set up a spatial dialogue through these sections to the open space surrounding the overall form. The resultant picture space that is created remains essentially internal - often forcing the eye to look in and 'read' the space rather than feel it as a palpable entity. An isometric sideways movement in one work felt bizarrely like a Japanese print. One thing that comes across is an artist really trying to work things out. This adds a feeling of a show based upon “introduction” rather than one based upon a “presentation.” Alongside this there is a rigour at work and that is something to enjoy.

The exhibition is very well set out. Pairs of opposing walls are fully hung or single works face each other. A tall rectangular yellow work featuring linear triangles on a dark charcoal grey looked strong on its own wall. The whole show hangs together well and the overall 'float' of works is good. We can see a clear sense of purpose felt through Concretist pragmatism. Lauand: "A picture is not explained. A picture is seen. The words are no substitute for a direct view of the formal structure of relations of colours, spaces, the plasticity and the organisation of similar elements.”

If an artwork has a tension it usually grabs our attention. There are moments in these works when the lines and spatial flips play out and draw you in to their subtle dramas, not in any heady way, but with a focus and a dead-eyed singularity. I left pondering how much mileage this approach to art through shape and design has today? Does it become tiring upon repeated viewing? I also mused upon concrete art’s opposition to figuration, yet ironically it replaced the certainties of figuration with those of geometry, regularity, pattern and the such - other ‘knowns’. Is the notion of a truth through apparent exactitude ultimately a misguided one? Matisse famously once said “exactitude is not truth.” However Lauand certainly is not a prisoner to style, and is clearly a sensitive artist who deserves attention. I think her phrase “formal structure” is key. Visual structure must serve a greater purpose. It can reveal the known through the unknown. This phase of work was perhaps more a case of the unknown revealed through the known.

Judith Lauand: The 1950s' at Stephen Friedman Gallery, London (8 February–9 March 2013).

Peter Hedegaard: 2012 (published by Abstract Critical) →

Peter Hedegaard 1970s gouaches at Rocket gallery, London 2/4/13 - 15/6/13

Since the eighties, Art, Craft and Design has become progressively mushed together in the national curriculum. Wonderful pieces of equipment, such as lathes and potter’s wheels find themselves in skips or as items for sale from the more entrepreneurial of establishments. Less and less schools are able to deliver these subjects with the correct provision - for time, space and budget dictate other priorities. Unfortunately being business-savvy is now part of the make-up of the modern, state school. More’s the pity too. As we stumble in iPod oblivion to our digital nirvana, what will our children continue to make? What factures will they “manu.” The hand made (manus) is now synonymous with the luxury end of the market alone. The visual metaphor for work has changed from the spanner to the PC.

I preface this review with these thoughts about the nature of Art in our schools, because I could not help but notice that Hedegaard was a product of Charterhouse and Hertford College, Oxford. I wondered what he was taught and how significant his education was to his mature work. I had a two great formative Art teachers - one a painter, the other a printmaker. The latter (a former sergeant- major) made think about temperature in colour, real mixing and how to put one colour on top of another. Anyone who considers this a straightforward task is insensitive to painting as an art form and will not be able to fully grasp the wonders it can excite in our eyes; the surprise of the unforeseen is what Art is uniquely equipped to deliver.

It is worth remembering the difference between Art and Design. Design must have a function - a purpose beyond its aesthetic form. Art need not do this. That is its virtue. Oh! So many people want it to perform in ways that are simply not in its DNA. There are theories abound and numerous, highly educated discourses that miss this fact. Frank ‘thingy’ makes a couple of valid points in a recent, enjoyable article on Larry Poons. He lamented Art as having become increasingly about “displays” and went on to note the demise of the art student as a sensitive visual practitioner - plus he made a fun throwaway comment about studios...“surely anyone can see the best painting, and by extension the best art making activity of our time takes place on the surfaces other than those for which it was intended.”

I enjoy good design as much as the next person and despair as much as the next when it is bad - or worse, masquerades as Art. A point agreed with director Jonathan Stephenson at Rocket Gallery, whilst looking at the works in this exhibition.

How to appreciate these works then? They sit up in colour; sharp and sunny in a modest, welcoming space. Generously framed. It took me sometime to get a take on them: If Art were a “red” and Design were a “yellow,” this show has the gravitational pull of a vermillion. Indeed, it comes as no surprise to see them resplendent in the context of the cool pieces of Dutch and Scandinavian furniture in the adjacent room.

Clean divisions - usually the raw paper - often surround squares, rectangles and trapezoids, as pathways through regular mazes. Hedegaard favoured high key colour - primary and secondary with several harmonic tonal sequences: in another time and place they would operate much like a colour swatch in a Pantone Matching System book. The best work seemed at first glance to be “Square Sequence (red/ blue/ green/ purple)” for all the linearity of these colours, the fact they suggested an alternate contrasting row movement, afforded it an unpredictability which was refreshing. (From the handout it appeared pre-sold)

These gouaches are meticulously painted - tiny dots and erased lines reveal the pencilled method of measuring and demarking shapes to be literally coloured in. There are subtle shifts of rows across one 1cm, then 2, then 3. Imagine a row of tiled steps but without the added eye-line perspective, so they could easily be read as stepped volumes as much as looking like stacked shapes: shunting systematically and incrementally, sideways. The fact that "Perspective " is used as a title on one of

Peter Hedegaard 1970s gouaches at Rocket gallery, London 2/4/13 - 15/6/13

the number that are divided with diagonals, which move in a single point perspectival logic, seems to imply the artist was fully aware of this illusion - intended it even, as a supposed gainsaid. Nothing here is overpainted. Things are worked out and executed accordingly. There is a pervasive sense of proportion that is separate also to the making. The Golden Rectangle sprang to mind - as did Fibonacci. I could well be miles off, granted. The colour seems very carefully considered and there are tensions in the work that give it a spine which stops it drifting into visual Muzak.

The screen prints which were part of a previous exhibition and some of which were in evidence take the gouache studies to their clinical conclusions. There are some well assembled colour “chords” in the prints - the little irregularities now lost in the smack, bang, wallop of the squeegee’s precision. Differences become essential when surface is so even and unforgiving.

We are told that Hedegaard became disillusioned with the art world (queue forming) after an early success at the John Moores. Thence, turned inwards to explore colour in ever more exacting systems. I get a sense of unease when I hear about an artist working on the theory of colour - images of bits of coloured paper pinned like lab rats to be analysed when presented with other bits of coloured paper. These are much more jolly affairs though. How can one not but nod at high key colours carefully, pedagogically arranged? There are no great dramas here and no emotional highs either. This is not in their ambition though. They are pleasant, polite visual essays in colour; colours in relation to size and shape, colours as sequence, colours as rhythm: doomed to success, to be harsh.

I have pondered which medium best suits shape - shape as a definite delineated form - in any quasi polygonal state, and over this past year or so, have also wondered about the role of "shape/s" in a painting. Does collage or even screen printing do shape better than painting for example? (I do not mean that paintings should be "shapeless" or even not use shapes, as the edge determines the overall shape anyway. I have used masking tape, but I have this nagging feeling that in doing so, I was closing more doors than opening. It’s a feeling only, as I have no reductionist doctrines. It's just that geometries feel better realised through collage and print than through painting. I am saying this through the experiences of making all three - and exploring shape explicitly too. Furthermore, having an area marked out and then colouring it in, seems to be - ironically - akin to a sort of pre- determinism that is related to figuration. Colouring in feels the same as “designing” something. Having it all worked out before the final making bit occurs.

In conclusion; although this is a show about shape, sequence and interval, I am not convinced it is actually about colour per se - which seems a heck of a thing to say when you look at the works. It's as if the colour cancels itself out due to the overarching nature of the formats, or rather their design. These are colours, rather than colour. Colours are nice, colours are attractive and can serve an important function in design. Look at any Apple advert! In Art though they need to become colour. Hedegaard had worked originally in design and this is clear in the attack of the works, which have that design orientated singularity of intent and a feel for colour which is systematic. If designers start from a base of a pyramid and work their way to the concluding point of the apex, honing until a single certainty is arrived at; then artists start from the precariousness of the point and open out possibilities whilst maintaining an uncertain, unforeseen balancing act - it could fall down or it could stay up. This show is less pyramidal, more...rectangular.

Peter Hedegaard at Rocket Gallery, London

Closeness: 2012 (published by abstract critical) →

When looking at a work of art, we could measure our physical distance from it and get a number in either feet or metres, yet this measurement will be of little help in explaining the perception of distance we get when we look at the work. A work of art creates the sense of an illusory space in our minds, a space produced as a result of the interaction of colours, textures and forms. One has only to observe someone looking at an artwork in a gallery to see a judgment of this spatial distance in action – a viewer shifts their weight and moves in response to what they are seeing – trying to feel the work’s visual gravity and make sense of its inherent pictorial or object space against their own actual physical space. Looking at art is a physical activity. 

In good art this perceptual distance, to my mind, feels at its closest: spatial sensations are brought up to our eyes forcing us to deal with them, to confront visual content head on; the art becomes part of our own physical sensibilities, feeling as natural or even mysterious as nature itself – it’s a fully visual experience – not an easily describable one, an existential or even an ‘enlightened’ one, but one that is full and complete, in and as, itself. It starts and ends in the ‘arena of the visual.’ 

As an aside here, we marvel at a good actor’s work; they possess a character. We believe in the illusion they create, yet we are simultaneously aware of the humanity coming from them through their characterisation. We can relate to them and find aspects of our own human story in their portrayal. So too, is the case in a good work of art – not necessarily present in any narrative or with any symbolism, simply in the ‘feel’ of it. We know it when we see it, so to speak. The way forms or colours have been articulated, the scale, the textures – all this ‘visual food’ satisfies our appetite. 

I would venture the point that a painting should be a consequence of the decisions made in response to colour as a visual force, dependent upon surface, and not merely as a decorative element. I believe also that ‘closeness’ can only be achieved in its fullest sense when these colour forces are working together to create a summative – greater – force. The articulation of these forces through surface and colour control, I would define as “drawing.” I have begun to realise that this – elusive – summative force is directly comparable to the fluid, moving space of sight. Painting is a static art form, yet it is overtly and covertly informed by our moving field of vision. This visual information is then synthesised by the artist through the processes of painting. The greater the synthesis, the closer the painting feels, I believe. Displays of fastidious techniques, self-conscious stylisation, or even imposed formats are all factors that can push us visually further and further away from a work. This distancing weakens the work’s visual potency and a dwindling of its latent humanity follows. Some observers will settle for this distancing though, subconsciously perhaps, feeling more comfortable with art when it is perceptually more distant? I think it is easier even, to write about art when it is perceptually further away, too – distance seems to afford an easier access and often helps facilitate a convenient understanding in trite, transmutable terms. Consider the reams of words written in defence of poor art (there is an inversely proportionate link I’m sure). The best, most advanced works are incredibly difficult to describe, moving from the visual into the verbal is not straightforward; whereas too often we see a lazy figuration, an ‘abstract vernacular’ type of work -often with clumsy references to objects, people or places or kitsch subject matter; all of this lending itself seamlessly to uncritical description – this is usually work where irony has become a refuge. Visual art seems unfortunately prone to this sort of cultural mugging. 

An artist should respond critically to the materials they use, and through this response, stretch the physical qualities of these materials to their limits and thus explore their potency as materials for art making. Matisse thoughtfully noted this approach as understanding “the purity of the means of expression.” Degrees of expressiveness – if there are such things - could be said to manifest themselves in a work of art, as degrees of closeness. We can feel the humanity in a work of art through its closeness. 

I have described how painting and sculpture are affected by our field of vision in their conception and execution, yet I wonder how much do they really have in common as art forms (if anything)? If you are a painter how different is that sculptural hat and vice-versa? I see painters often who make sculpture that is a three-dimensional approximation of their with real space. Conversely, sculptors can be equally guilty of painting out three-dimensional relationships in which colour is subjugated to a “literal – spatial” descriptive role. Colour can generate space in unpredictable ways – it needn’t be choreographed. paintings, rather than existing as sculptural works which do something 

I believe that in sculpture the relationship of seeing to making is possibly in a more advanced state as a product of its modus-operandi, whereas we painters can often end up producing a spatial stasis by comparison. Sometimes it’s in the overarching, stifling appearance of a format, sometimes perhaps the self-consciously energetic approach, which involves much hit and hope and ending up with relatively little to show for all this attack. Another thing I have noted (and you can try this on a painting) the main field of activity is often a few centimetres inside the edges. Incidents sort of arrive at the edges but run out of steam by the time they get there. Advanced art has always acknowledged the importance of edge, but I am not sure if the problem has been solved with real conviction yet. Depth has replaced space too. Depth is a product of imagery, screens and illustrations. Space as felt by moving sight is a prize greater than staged or even accidental illusions of depth. The repoussoir devices and atmospheres of landscape often flavour even the better abstract art and the flip side of shallow-space overallness tends to undermine potentially more inventive, unpredictable spatial qualities. 

Cubist painting, to cite a high profile example was dogged by a centralised pictorial weighting, often struggled with the corners and ended up merely filling space with awkward – literal – planes of colour rather than describing or discovering it as a palpable entity. Cubist space has cast a long shadow over abstract artists who have been happy to work in its shade. There is something here that makes me consider that synthesis can turn into artifice when discovery is not present, and cubism ultimately presented artificially “composed” rather than “discovered” spaces. A monocular space similar in feel to that of the fixed viewpoint or the single lens. 

Being attuned to unpredictability is dependent upon having the confidence to ride out the shocks and uncertainty that go hand in hand with discovery. We could bring the notion of closeness back at this point, as maybe the visual quality needed to provide reassurance in the face of this uncertainty. There is more to discover in art – it should always be a work in progress. We need to remind ourselves of this. Looking at art from previous centuries is a sort of “communion” with the past that can surprise us in unforeseen ways. Think of a corkscrew turning in spirals through space – this corkscrew could represent art being made, constantly moving forwards as we look at it from a side-on viewpoint, veering up and down yet with ultimately, moving in a linear direction – our conventional notion of time passing. Now imagine moving around to one end of the corkscrew and we can see it turning in circles forever crossing imaginary radii which could be considered each as the different themes, approaches, whatever you want to call them, of art. From this viewpoint, art continues to cover the same impetuses, just at different times. This is why we can relate to it so strongly, so visually, on equally human terms. The best of art is always relevant, whenever or wherever it was made. 

Look at the paintings Matisse made after the Second World War, known collectively as the “Vence Interiors 1946-48.” These are a touchstone for me, for the kind of closeness that I have been describing. In these paintings you see a quite different kind of space. Light behaves oddly here. When you see one of these in the flesh you fully appreciate this phenomena. It’s as if light reflects and ‘bends’ in a slightly convex way outwards causing the colour sensation of the picture plane to settle just in front of the surface – not as a cheap optical trick but as a physical sense of real, even, super-real space. Colour, here, creates a luminosity through the sum of its forces, and in doing so equals the luminosity we feel through all sight. There is simply nothing like them in describing space, handling paint, and orchestrating colour, all in one hit. They glow incandescently. Before Matisse, luminosity tended to be merely an effect created through localised – atmospheric-style colour relationships – you hear phrases about how light has been “captured.” This is in the realm of tonal colour really. 

Colour can be a light generator, though, not merely a painterly effect. I am persuaded Matisse was able to do this because he constantly looked and recorded as he did so. By bouncing his glances off the multitude of fabrics, furniture, objects, flowers, interiors, windows, mirrors and figures that he set up, he peppered his canvases with complex incident and seemingly in-exhaustive space-defining relationships. All this studio ‘stuff’ gave him things to react to, and to invent with. Forms were absorbed into his muscle memory to be called upon spontaneously when he moved paint, or eventually cut paper. How can this fullness of space, this richness of incident be achieved without these prompts? Could an abstract artist gain a comparably expressive kind of muscle memory? And how can space be made that is part of our human visual sensibility rather than as an illustration of depth illusion, which panders more to the cerebral than the visceral? 

As I have stated, a good work of art is always made through a process of discovery, and as such is able to regenerate itself for successive ages and become non-culture specific. By this I mean, we are able to find fresh takes on it through the new viewfinders we create, as we in turn make our own art. Anecdote and symbol may be part of an educated mind’s codex, but humanity will out through the facts of the visual first and lastly. 

Recently, I have made several visits to London to see the “Diana and Castillo” painting by Titian in the National Gallery. It is a stunning painting with a heady, sweaty-like intensity. Look closely at how the weave of space never breaks the picture plane. Titian can simultaneously make heavy fabric droop and fall and turn in space without becoming ‘sculptural’; it is three-dimensional yes but on painting’s terms not sculpture’s. Titian was the master at creating a wholeness in space and colour. The transitions of one body to another, dogs which pop up as inventive space-filling devices to maintain rhythms, and figures prone to propel ever more complex internal arabesques. The space is breathable yet entirely synthetic and artificial in conception. How does he do this? We can look at his works and map his development from early, more heavily composed, almost strategic paintings to the later ones that are “found” through the workings of the painting. He really dragged these forms out of the paint, creating the picture space and adjusting things as he worked. This fluidity became the essence of the work. Maybe there is a clue here? I am reminded of the sentiment of odyssey – you will find a treasure but not the one you necessarily seek. You cannot second guess your art; you have to make it. 

I want to return finally to that point of sculpture and its relationship to painting. Wholeness is a prize in painting which may be achieved as I have suggested in its fullest sense through the closeness of the colour experience. I am still in the belief that the quality of wholeness is a relevant pursuit to painting, yet one that is remarkably difficult to achieve (especially the more challenge you take on). How can a sculpture gain this sense of wholeness or rather why should it? 

Much advanced abstract sculpture has primarily concerned itself with the qualities of object-ness, which, although is an approach that can still produce works to engage and impress, is not really developing the full potential of the medium. If a sculpture is to be truly challenging it needs to go beyond this approach and do something more urgent with space, move a viewer around it more, and through this movement set up relationships that cause conflicts as much as resolutions. This moving, relational, give and take is dynamic not static. Changeability is surely a virtue in a sculpture. I want to move when I see it, find its rhythms and be surprised as I move around it. If it has any awkwardness, this may not necessarily be a weakness, it may well be a marker for a greater completeness that is revealed through the continuity of time spent in visual dialogue with the work – an acidic note that sharpens a creamier one so to speak. Dealing with relational conflicts is something that sculpture may offer painting as another way forward too. Seeing an element as a force, in the way that colour can be perceived in a painting, is an offering coming the other way maybe. Sculptures should aspire to “completeness” rather than “wholeness” perhaps? Completeness would thus be time-dependent. 

Those actors I mentioned earlier might have their good sides, sculptures needn’t be so vain. If a painting needs to open out space by creating a cohesive sense of light, a sculpture needs to open out space by creating a cohesive sense of time. 

John Bunker: 2012 (published by abstract critical) →

"Vital signs": looking for life in the deathly pit of the rubbish bin: bits and bobs that once served other purposes have been resuscitated, re-energised, reconfigured and pictorialised. Mary Shelley would be proud: detritus, distressed debris, angles, curves and awkward bits, stringy and sticky, tape and paint, stain and scuff, card marred - stuck and torn, ripped and ruptured, rumpled and worn - diagonals forced into framing rectangles that echo the edges, with drawn tears in surfaces that want to be something significant again, something more than they once were: from the mundane to the particular, from the scrap heap to the gallery wall.... It's alive! An artwork is born.

These works often seem more successful when contrasts of dark and light are used to underpin their colour and punch past the irregular factures of surface. A tonal colour prevails (not dominates), rather than a painterly one, which is present too; tones lend themselves to the art of the found, I have found. This exhibition is a mix of the poetic and the prosaic, switching haphazardly between the two, as I feel obliged to, too.

There is a nonstop unrelenting pace to this show which has 21 works all in the average family sized home's conventional picture frames which are better when the disparate elements are integrated into the whole and the shadows of the card are not disturbing the continuity of the passages of colour and the fracturing incident and dissonant elements are dissolving into the backgrounds of the found cardboard in these old frames which have been discovered poking up through the rubble maybe or on streets or waste grounds or simply loitering with intent in the emporia of the previously enjoyed and have been assembled with troubling incongruity or artful poise at times knowingly anarchic controllingly almost tastefully split splattered crumpled and crocked taped and splintered and composed...occasionally maybe too willfully? I need a breath before I go on. They are busy in this first viewing.

Much stuff to see and take in as a whole: split pieces of orange hessian, mdf panelling, semi-architectural, fragmentary pieces of string, looping, very consciously looking for pictoriality. Maybe we all need to find a more surprising pictoriality? What is pictoriality anyway? That question floats in the air somewhere on this occasion, around the streets of Limehouse, East London.

Collage: found stuff in skips, bins, corners of the studio, dribbles and scribbles of paint and ink, semi-illusionistic devices, photo copies, printed pieces, pieces of this, pieces of that, a piece of text, placed in the scene - not to be read, but to animate with that sting of black and white, there's a keen eye and a sort of taste at work, but by the back door, the worn out door, after all, it takes taste as well as an eye to find these picture frames and respond accordingly; a greenish one, lots of degrees of wooden browns, a warm orangery edging which is picked up on, a thick one in light wood or a thin one in black, a hard one, an old one, a many time bought and sold one - a box frame or two - which calls for a different approach. The more relief works would be better left unchecked by painterly incident where shunted shapes and forms could occupy and impose themselves more in the space of the shadow box. Geoff Rigden's recent works spring to mind - a master of the found, who can make a stiletto look good in a collaged, deep box-framed, artwork; art which has its

precedents in the early 60's: Daniel Spoerri or Harry Thubron's "Anything can be art" teachings, or even (unwelcomely?)back in the thirties and forties with Joseph Cornell's surreal poetry boxes. Cubism is the root stock though. Back to the show: There is a myriad of opportunity afforded in the making of these collages, to travel in all sorts of directions, though decisions about colour and tone will surface at all points and junctions along the way. The colour and drawing would possibly benefit from bigger scales at times - maybe more unpredictable illusions and a greater sense of frankness with some of the

larger components. A glimpse of photo paper looked good, and what about that dreaded word...imagery? Could imagery make an appearance? Could that be integrated? Would that become more, or less visual in character? I know the sculptor Clay Ellis has been mining this territory in his recent collages, through the pre-made though, rather than the found.

Exhibition spaces: are not always neutral, and these works are a little overhung in the space. There is clearly a keenness to show a body of work, but it would have benefitted from knocking out a half dozen to tidy up the hanging. I don't think the previous frame owners would ever recognize their discarded property, though there is an element of recognition in the space and it was tempting to name check references that materialised for me at least: Motherwell, maybe, maybe not, Rauschenberg, maybe, maybe not, Picasso, Miro,́ the usual suspects, Schwitters, who knows? Perhaps even a Bacon buts in, a Spanish still-life? Leǵ er, qui sais? Is that a 13th century vibe or are we in Persia? So much attention to detail; the mind's eye plays funny tricks when so much is up for grabs. Can this tendency to spark a referencing be headed off at the pass in some way? Can an artist produce a work that did not allow that or are we always prey to these comparisons? Are they courted even? Does subjectiveness emerge when the material content becomes so open- ended, or is it always latent or, am I guilty of not looking hard enough and dragging my looking into my already known? I have only seen the exhibition once but will revisit.

The frames seem to act as a start, a visual prompter, yet they are vulnerable to interpretation as a poetical device, whether intended or not. Ultimately, they serve the purpose of unifier. Even considering this point, I would still question their importance to the success of the actual collage. They may not be as useful as they look: all that flattering, flattening glass can hide some of the technical issues of the collage’s manufacture, for instance. Also, why was the frame not on the image of the handout? How significant are they really? The works build structure earnestly, through layer upon layer of incident devoid of, or minimized in, accident I'm sure; however, the irregularities can feel a touch arbitrary at times. This is not a criticism of the approach, more a critique of the results. The work feels to be in an emerging state with the ensuing hit and miss outcomes; this should be seen as a sign of artistic health. I enjoyed the instances of ‘disturbing’ colour when they were in there as this made everything work harder and avoided any vestiges of the artful. Also, better to see too, was when works were less respectful of the rectangle, which is so strongly asserted by the frame. Often the internal echoing of this frame with ‘angled’ card, seemed to be dictated as a prerequisite strategy for composition - creating

centralised weightings of activity, which in turn had the effect of closing in the space and darkening the work accordingly. Sometimes a bit of ‘open the curtains and get some light into the room’ was needed. Then again, who am I to talk? For moonlight and shadows also have a light and colour, and then there's neon, the backlight of consumerism; tawdriness can be a form of beauty as well. After all, as someone Bloomsbury way once said: "We're all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.”

Stephen Lewis: 2012 (published by abstract critical) →

Stephen Lewis is showing work from approximately ten years at The Cut Gallery, Halesworth, Suffolk. It affords the viewer a chance to catch up with the works of this first rate sculptor in an “overview” exhibition. It is surprising that this is his first one person show since 2006 and as such is significant. We have had several tasters in various group shows of his practice and concerns, but not lately seen the relationships between works that is so important in an advanced artist’s work. There are some 15 sculptures and 22 drawings on show. The sculptures are predominately in steel, though there are cast plaster pieces that explore form and texture through an oblique figuration. Colour weaves its way throughout the show in subtle ways: in the raw materials and painted or glazed surfaces.

Due to the space of this gallery the works are modestly human-sized or smaller. I’ve often felt that his talents really flourish when he handles large scale works. A recent commissioned sculpture Rare Earth for a school in Rayleigh was particularly memorable and very successful as a project. A number of his looping, transparent billowing ones would have related more closely to the drawings on show as they share qualities of linearity. I feel this would have given a more comprehensive picture, especially to a visitor not familiar with his work.

Some of the works have illusions of and allusions to a landscape in its widest possible definition (perhaps urban, perhaps not); yet none of these should be seen as specific references, more as observed forms that draw us in and invite further enquiry.

These recognisable extras add rather than detract from the whole though. In the work of a lesser artist these kinds of devices would almost certainly appear bogus. Lewis has a facility of touch and handling that enables him to also integrate ‘given’ forms and to use them to play off improvised sections, animating the works even further. You notice the known forms also but never dwell on them. The whole becomes greater than the sum of its parts.

There are several works that employ a cross-slotted pair of straight-sided, round cornered rectangles – precise, laser cut structures either skinny or squat – a brass one was shown in the RA Summer Exhibition this year. To my eye these works end up a little more forced in their elegance. Does considered placement give as much back visually as discovered forming? Only time will tell if they are as successful as the more irregularly shaped works. I am reserving judgement as I feel that they are part of the evolution of planar forces in Lewis’s expansive vocabulary and as such have not yet found their fullest role; they are protean at the very least. I hope to see more linear / planar works as this is a territory he is fast making his own – particularly when he uses the ‘silhouette’ styled improvised contours I alluded to earlier. These elements introduce an exciting kind of probing drawing that is present in other works in more volumetric ways but similar in spirit and equally satisfying. The more “found” works feel bigger in impact and claim a greater intimacy because of their hand wrought-ness.

Line is coolly controlled here and often appears as a straight element or part of an open structure – a windmill like front to the slotted forms, for example, and I wondered how much more could be done with linear elements in relation to the contoured planes or volumes; space could really be opened up in more unforeseen ways.

A Lewis sculpture has a very specific and individual sense of gravity. Steel is often made pliable, soft and bendy, yet maintains its rigidity and its tensile strength. Expression is arrived at through the way the material is used. There is often a pervasive “pear shaped” weighting that is almost

leviathan-like in its sense of scale. There are several of these works in this show, but Lewis is one of the most eclectic sculptors working today and cannot be pinned down to any one approach – he is equally adept at dealing with mass, line, plane and perhaps most tellingly (and understatedly) colour. Lewis is skilled in using colour as an integral rather than a decorative element. In his more recent steel works he prefers to spray or hand paint with a range of matte greyed colour, but when it is chromatically high key he achieves one of the most successful works in the show Attractor – with its pod organic growths thrusting up and turning periscope-like – all garish and scrubby orange – the form of it made in curved pieces which have a patchwork togetherness. This work feels grown rather than made – it looks as if it would be most at home outdoors where it could jostle and poke fun at the comparatively shy-looking plants of our temperate climate.

The ink and charcoal drawings and a handful of prints on show here are unashamedly figurative and play an almost sneaky “partner in crime” role. At first glance they are Thurber-esque with a casual insouciance but this is not the state of affairs at all when you really look at them and consider them against the sculptures they encircle.

The line in several works is definite and strident, their wittiness is often abrasive and even slightly chilling. There is a large unsettling drawing of a “character” in close up where each feature element is a clean formal statement. I reflected here about sideways glances to the Japanese “ōkao-e” large face prints – a subtle link perhaps to the deftness that is prevalent in some of the most recent sculptures.

These drawings position themselves as works of fact and caper independently alongside the sculptures rather than pandering to them as supporting studies often do. They raise a telling and intriguing question about the purpose and function of drawing for a sculptor. Look at a Moore drawing for example with its ‘obvious’ description of forms, stone-like in their three-dimensional illusion – suggesting sculptures yet to be made. Lewis employs an antithetical, sophisticated yet almost bloody-minded approach by comparison, similar in characteristic to some of the qualities he has as a sculptor: direct, subversive and with a lightness of touch. His drawings go off on their own merry tangents with a purposeful impetus, many of them taking us into worlds of impossible scenarios often peopled by odd cone-hatted characters. He will deliberately provide comedic titles, such as Police Dog Stand-Off. The depictions are unnervingly satisfying. I am reminded of the quotation “God was a comedian playing to an audience who was too afraid to laugh.” These drawings may be dreamlike in their poetic musings on the human condition, but they are forthright in their visuality and couldn’t really be translated to another medium. Buster Keaton had a wonderful pathos less contrived than Chaplin’s – when regarding the qualities of these drawings, this is the closest ‘translation’ that I can suggest.

The show runs till the end of November. I recommend it enthusiastically, and to those people not as familiar with the range of Lewis’s work, it will give a real insight into the achievements of this significant sculptor.