JAMES TOWER CERAMICS, SCULPTURES AND DRAWINGS
CONTENTS
4
INTRODUCTION AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Timothy Wilcox
8
JAMES TOWER, POTTER-ARTIST
Timothy Wilcox
30
ARTIST’S STATEMENT 1982
James Tower
36
‘NEITHER POTS NOR VESSELS’: THE CERAMICS OF JAMES TOWER
Tanya Harrod
44
ARTIST’S STATEMENT 1968
James Tower
46
ANIMATING THE SURFACE. JAMES TOWER’S ORGANIC CERAMICS OF THE 1950S
Lesley Jackson
54
ARTIST’S STATEMENT 1982
James Tower
56
SCULPTURE, MODELLING AND POTTERY
Conor Wilson
60
CERAMICS, SCULPTURES AND DRAWINGS
94 Public collections 1 James Tower at Corsham, mid 1950s
95 Chronology
CONTENTS
4
INTRODUCTION AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Timothy Wilcox
8
JAMES TOWER, POTTER-ARTIST
Timothy Wilcox
30
ARTIST’S STATEMENT 1982
James Tower
36
‘NEITHER POTS NOR VESSELS’: THE CERAMICS OF JAMES TOWER
Tanya Harrod
44
ARTIST’S STATEMENT 1968
James Tower
46
ANIMATING THE SURFACE. JAMES TOWER’S ORGANIC CERAMICS OF THE 1950S
Lesley Jackson
54
ARTIST’S STATEMENT 1982
James Tower
56
SCULPTURE, MODELLING AND POTTERY
Conor Wilson
60
CERAMICS, SCULPTURES AND DRAWINGS
94 Public collections 1 James Tower at Corsham, mid 1950s
95 Chronology
As the decade of the 1950s progressed, Tower became increasingly adventurous. Isolated from the playful vernacular of Newland and his Central School followers on the one hand and from the pseudo-orientalism of Leach on the other, he
11 Oblong Dish. 1958. Earthenware with tin glaze. Dimensions unknown. Pottery Quarterly, Winter 1959
seemed to form a one-man movement. He was a painter working in clay, and his concerns were much more closely mirrored in the work of artists such as Victor Pasmore or Graham Sutherland than anything in the field of ceramics. This suggestion tends to be confirmed by the crisis Tower experienced in 1958–59 when he stopped making glazed vessels of any sort and began to concentrate on large sculptural forms in pale terracotta, some of which were cast in bronze. Dissatisfaction
10 Fish Dish. 1957. Earthenware with tin glaze. L: 46.5 cm. Erskine Hall & Coe
of the École de Paris.10 The so-called abstraction lyrique of artists such as Jean-René Bazaine (1904–2001), who made specific reference in his picture titles to trees, woods and other landscape motifs, was more sensual and organic than the geometric, analytical tendencies of British abstraction. This Continental influence may have led Tower towards the series of fish platters which emerged in the mid 1950s, where the form is more literal but the decoration looser and more expressive, as if to evoke the dappled light playing on the surface of the water the fish is submerged in.
16
Timothy Wilcox
James Tower, potter-artist
17
As the decade of the 1950s progressed, Tower became increasingly adventurous. Isolated from the playful vernacular of Newland and his Central School followers on the one hand and from the pseudo-orientalism of Leach on the other, he
11 Oblong Dish. 1958. Earthenware with tin glaze. Dimensions unknown. Pottery Quarterly, Winter 1959
seemed to form a one-man movement. He was a painter working in clay, and his concerns were much more closely mirrored in the work of artists such as Victor Pasmore or Graham Sutherland than anything in the field of ceramics. This suggestion tends to be confirmed by the crisis Tower experienced in 1958–59 when he stopped making glazed vessels of any sort and began to concentrate on large sculptural forms in pale terracotta, some of which were cast in bronze. Dissatisfaction
10 Fish Dish. 1957. Earthenware with tin glaze. L: 46.5 cm. Erskine Hall & Coe
of the École de Paris.10 The so-called abstraction lyrique of artists such as Jean-René Bazaine (1904–2001), who made specific reference in his picture titles to trees, woods and other landscape motifs, was more sensual and organic than the geometric, analytical tendencies of British abstraction. This Continental influence may have led Tower towards the series of fish platters which emerged in the mid 1950s, where the form is more literal but the decoration looser and more expressive, as if to evoke the dappled light playing on the surface of the water the fish is submerged in.
16
Timothy Wilcox
James Tower, potter-artist
17
or even woodland and field patterns evoking qualities of longevity and resilience. The Suez Crisis of 1956 was more than a wake-up call that Britain’s international influence was on the wane; it sent a collective shudder through the British consciousness, requiring a re-evaluation of old certainties. The art world’s embrace of
15 Study for sculpture Hollow Form. c. 1960–65. Pen and ink, brown wash and white bodycolour on paper, 20.8 × 36.5 cm. Private collection
the new American painting was a challenge to the establishment, a prophetic participation in a different world order, cold, harsh and uncomfortable though it was. Tower’s personal reinvention as a sculptor took place through these years of enormous creativity in British art. Despite having exhibited his pottery six times with Gimpel fils during the 1950s, he did not appear in magazine advertisements as one of their stable of artists.15 When, after a five-year absence, he mounted his first exhibition of sculpture, he was honoured with an illustrated catalogue, an indicator of status, certainly, but one which reflected the higher monetary value of work which required marketing and capital investment, especially if the unique terracottas were
14 Concave Form X. 1962. Unglazed white earthen ware. 46 × 64 cm. Private collection
riverbeds, scour through the earth, opening up the form, connecting the surface with the interior. Tapering to a foot at the base, they are still also ceramic jars, their interior volume cracked open by some seismic force. British landscape imagery of the 1940s and 1950s was essentially traditional and looked to nature as a symbol of timeless values through a period of upheaval, destruction and rebirth.14 Landscape represented the national character, both directly through association with specific places and indirectly with ruins, standing stones
20
Timothy Wilcox
James Tower, potter-artist
21
or even woodland and field patterns evoking qualities of longevity and resilience. The Suez Crisis of 1956 was more than a wake-up call that Britain’s international influence was on the wane; it sent a collective shudder through the British consciousness, requiring a re-evaluation of old certainties. The art world’s embrace of
15 Study for sculpture Hollow Form. c. 1960–65. Pen and ink, brown wash and white bodycolour on paper, 20.8 × 36.5 cm. Private collection
the new American painting was a challenge to the establishment, a prophetic participation in a different world order, cold, harsh and uncomfortable though it was. Tower’s personal reinvention as a sculptor took place through these years of enormous creativity in British art. Despite having exhibited his pottery six times with Gimpel fils during the 1950s, he did not appear in magazine advertisements as one of their stable of artists.15 When, after a five-year absence, he mounted his first exhibition of sculpture, he was honoured with an illustrated catalogue, an indicator of status, certainly, but one which reflected the higher monetary value of work which required marketing and capital investment, especially if the unique terracottas were
14 Concave Form X. 1962. Unglazed white earthen ware. 46 × 64 cm. Private collection
riverbeds, scour through the earth, opening up the form, connecting the surface with the interior. Tapering to a foot at the base, they are still also ceramic jars, their interior volume cracked open by some seismic force. British landscape imagery of the 1940s and 1950s was essentially traditional and looked to nature as a symbol of timeless values through a period of upheaval, destruction and rebirth.14 Landscape represented the national character, both directly through association with specific places and indirectly with ruins, standing stones
20
Timothy Wilcox
James Tower, potter-artist
21
16 Concave Form VIII. 1961. Bronze. 47 × 78.7 × 25.4 cm. Erskine, Hall & Coe
to be cast in bronze, as envisaged. In some respects there is a strong element of
their rounder shapes evoking clumps of foliage. Copse, for which numerous stud-
continuity between the last ceramics and the first sculptures; the voids painted onto
ies exist, is the most complex, an outburst of organic growth which then folds over,
the black-and-white bowls become large hollows, their stripy surround is incised
protectively, to form an arch or cave. As Head of Sculpture at Brighton Polytechnic,
over the entire surface. As furrows or geological strata, they mirror a process where
Tower extended his investigations into new materials, producing a large panel in
two dimensions become three, keeping both options open.
fibreglass which is effectively a painting, with splashes of tinted resin re-enacting
The fourteen large pieces exhibited in 1963 seem to reflect a long process of
22
Timothy Wilcox
17 Fibreglass Panel with Spray Pattern. 1975. Fibreglass. 91.5 × 183 cm. Private collection
the sea spray he observed just yards from his classroom.
refinement, their forms pared down to the essentials, and they perhaps stick too
In none of Tower’s work of the 1960s and 1970s is figuration entirely aban-
close to their ceramic forbears. Few of them are realised fully in the round but in-
doned. Indeed the longer he worked, the more the nature imagery of the 1950s
stead present a single aspect to the viewer, one which often reads as a negative
tended to reassert itself. The impulse to return to ceramics in 1978 was driven in
space, with all the wider implications of that epithet. The drawings, none of which
part by the realisation that pottery engages directly with the dimension of time, the
are dated, are more daring, exploring images of transformation and fragmentation.
idea implanted by Dora Billington right at the outset of Tower’s experience of the
The ribbed effect of parallel white lines is virtually the only element common to
medium. On a sheet of lecture notes, Tower later wrote, ‘Ceramics less intellectu-
both drawings and sculptures, so it is not certain whether drawing preceded sculp-
al than sculpture[,] more emotive response to surface and form, quicker – more
ture or led out of it.
existential’.16
By the time of Tower’s next exhibition, in Brighton in 1968, the forms are dy-
Drawing, as a means of developing ideas for sculpture, was, when it came to it,
namic and also more descriptive, with verticals suggesting tree trunks or plant stems,
too slow, too indirect, and a poor substitute for actually making. With clay Tower
James Tower, potter-artist
23
16 Concave Form VIII. 1961. Bronze. 47 × 78.7 × 25.4 cm. Erskine, Hall & Coe
to be cast in bronze, as envisaged. In some respects there is a strong element of
their rounder shapes evoking clumps of foliage. Copse, for which numerous stud-
continuity between the last ceramics and the first sculptures; the voids painted onto
ies exist, is the most complex, an outburst of organic growth which then folds over,
the black-and-white bowls become large hollows, their stripy surround is incised
protectively, to form an arch or cave. As Head of Sculpture at Brighton Polytechnic,
over the entire surface. As furrows or geological strata, they mirror a process where
Tower extended his investigations into new materials, producing a large panel in
two dimensions become three, keeping both options open.
fibreglass which is effectively a painting, with splashes of tinted resin re-enacting
The fourteen large pieces exhibited in 1963 seem to reflect a long process of
22
Timothy Wilcox
17 Fibreglass Panel with Spray Pattern. 1975. Fibreglass. 91.5 × 183 cm. Private collection
the sea spray he observed just yards from his classroom.
refinement, their forms pared down to the essentials, and they perhaps stick too
In none of Tower’s work of the 1960s and 1970s is figuration entirely aban-
close to their ceramic forbears. Few of them are realised fully in the round but in-
doned. Indeed the longer he worked, the more the nature imagery of the 1950s
stead present a single aspect to the viewer, one which often reads as a negative
tended to reassert itself. The impulse to return to ceramics in 1978 was driven in
space, with all the wider implications of that epithet. The drawings, none of which
part by the realisation that pottery engages directly with the dimension of time, the
are dated, are more daring, exploring images of transformation and fragmentation.
idea implanted by Dora Billington right at the outset of Tower’s experience of the
The ribbed effect of parallel white lines is virtually the only element common to
medium. On a sheet of lecture notes, Tower later wrote, ‘Ceramics less intellectu-
both drawings and sculptures, so it is not certain whether drawing preceded sculp-
al than sculpture[,] more emotive response to surface and form, quicker – more
ture or led out of it.
existential’.16
By the time of Tower’s next exhibition, in Brighton in 1968, the forms are dy-
Drawing, as a means of developing ideas for sculpture, was, when it came to it,
namic and also more descriptive, with verticals suggesting tree trunks or plant stems,
too slow, too indirect, and a poor substitute for actually making. With clay Tower
James Tower, potter-artist
23
24 Fish Shoal. 1979. Earthenware with tin glaze. H: 35 cm. Private collection
32
James Tower
25 Self-Portrait. c. 1946–47. Pen with red ink and grey wash on paper. 50 × 38 cm. Private collection
Personal statement
33
24 Fish Shoal. 1979. Earthenware with tin glaze. H: 35 cm. Private collection
32
James Tower
25 Self-Portrait. c. 1946–47. Pen with red ink and grey wash on paper. 50 × 38 cm. Private collection
Personal statement
33
JAMES TOWER: SCULPTURE 1968
31 Divided Form. 1965. Unglazed white earthen ware. 48 × 38 cm. Private collection 32 Landscape Study. c. 1960–65. Wash and white bodycolour, 24.5 × 55.5 cm. Private collection
My sculptures show those aspects of the natural world which have absorbed me. Sometimes, as the titles indicate, they stem from a particular place or object. Others refer to certain forms which are paralleled in man-made things. The shallow concavities which hold light and shadow on the downs, parallel the same shallow concavity which holds light and shadow on the palm of the hand. Again, it is paralleled in the concavities and convexities of objects worn by use. The small sculptures made in 1964 and 1965 are preliminary workings for l arger pieces which will be less complex in their forms.
Printed on the verso of the announcement card, Lancaster House, Arts Centre, University of Sussex, 21 February–23 March 1968.
Personal statement
45
JAMES TOWER: SCULPTURE 1968
31 Divided Form. 1965. Unglazed white earthen ware. 48 × 38 cm. Private collection 32 Landscape Study. c. 1960–65. Wash and white bodycolour, 24.5 × 55.5 cm. Private collection
My sculptures show those aspects of the natural world which have absorbed me. Sometimes, as the titles indicate, they stem from a particular place or object. Others refer to certain forms which are paralleled in man-made things. The shallow concavities which hold light and shadow on the downs, parallel the same shallow concavity which holds light and shadow on the palm of the hand. Again, it is paralleled in the concavities and convexities of objects worn by use. The small sculptures made in 1964 and 1965 are preliminary workings for l arger pieces which will be less complex in their forms.
Printed on the verso of the announcement card, Lancaster House, Arts Centre, University of Sussex, 21 February–23 March 1968.
Personal statement
45
48 Three studies for sculp ture, c. 1960–65. Ink and gouache, 38 × 26.5 cm. The channel carved through the solid form changes from a wide groove into an open hollow, from two to three dimensions, creating a new, negative space within the existing block
72
49 Study for sculpture Layered Form. c. 1960–65. Pen and ink, brown wash and white bodycolour on paper, 16.3 × 22.7 cm. Private collection
73
48 Three studies for sculp ture, c. 1960–65. Ink and gouache, 38 × 26.5 cm. The channel carved through the solid form changes from a wide groove into an open hollow, from two to three dimensions, creating a new, negative space within the existing block
72
49 Study for sculpture Layered Form. c. 1960–65. Pen and ink, brown wash and white bodycolour on paper, 16.3 × 22.7 cm. Private collection
73
55 Drawing, c. 1965–66. Black and white chalk and wash, 43 × 52 cm. 56 Drawing, c. 1965–66. Black chalk, watercolour and gouache, 46.2 × 58.2 cm.
78
57 Tree, 1965. White terracotta. H: 35 cm. Victoria Art Gallery, Bath. The flared tops of each separate stem allude to a thrown vessel, fixing these abstracted forms as part of a tradition of making, as well as of idealised nature
79
55 Drawing, c. 1965–66. Black and white chalk and wash, 43 × 52 cm. 56 Drawing, c. 1965–66. Black chalk, watercolour and gouache, 46.2 × 58.2 cm.
78
57 Tree, 1965. White terracotta. H: 35 cm. Victoria Art Gallery, Bath. The flared tops of each separate stem allude to a thrown vessel, fixing these abstracted forms as part of a tradition of making, as well as of idealised nature
79
59 Fish Plate. 1978. Earthenware with tin glaze. W: 37 cm. Private collection
58 Studies for sculpture Block with Horizontal L ayers. c. 1967–68. Graphite, ink, watercolour and gouache, 38 × 56 cm. One of Tower’s most intriguing groups of studies for layered stacks that were never realised. They are a curious premonition of the more recent tree carvings of David Nash, and show the continuing fascination of the dual concepts of Growth and Form
80
81
59 Fish Plate. 1978. Earthenware with tin glaze. W: 37 cm. Private collection
58 Studies for sculpture Block with Horizontal L ayers. c. 1967–68. Graphite, ink, watercolour and gouache, 38 × 56 cm. One of Tower’s most intriguing groups of studies for layered stacks that were never realised. They are a curious premonition of the more recent tree carvings of David Nash, and show the continuing fascination of the dual concepts of Growth and Form
80
81
65 Sea Piece II, 1985. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 56 cm. Private collection
88
66 Large Circular Form. 1985. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 52.5 cm. P rivate collection. This impressive piece evokes a firework exploding in two phases, extending out across the sky
89
65 Sea Piece II, 1985. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 56 cm. Private collection
88
66 Large Circular Form. 1985. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 52.5 cm. P rivate collection. This impressive piece evokes a firework exploding in two phases, extending out across the sky
89
68 Ribbed Form. 1980. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 33 cm. Private collection. The uneven application of white glaze gives the ribbed surface the appearance of having been rubbed away or eroded over time
92
69 Pod Form. 1985. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 56 cm. Private collection
93
68 Ribbed Form. 1980. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 33 cm. Private collection. The uneven application of white glaze gives the ribbed surface the appearance of having been rubbed away or eroded over time
92
69 Pod Form. 1985. Earthenware with tin glaze, H: 56 cm. Private collection
93