art from the
margins Outside In: National The pioneering competition for non-traditional artists Jean Dubuffet A major review of the father of Art Brut Gwen John and Celia Paul Dr Rowan Williams introduces two painters in parallel Bobby Baker The artist on her hidden history of mental illness
£2 Number 28 October 2012 – February 2013 www.pallant.org.uk
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IN A STUNNING SETTING 10 minutes drive from Chichester Cass Sculpture Foundation, Goodwood West Sussex PO18 0QP
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Contents Features
Chaz Waldren, The Helmet of Salvation Š the artist
You can find full details of our latest events programme in the What's On guide. Previous copies of the Gallery magazine, as well as all the latest news, exhibitions and events, can be viewed online at www.pallant.org.uk You can also follow us at .com/pallantgallery .com/pallantgallery
18 Bringing the Outside In Marc Steene 22 Outsider Art and Beyond John Maizels 25 Perspectives: The Marginal Arts Tony Heaton and Roger Cardinal 26 The Father of Art Brut Katy Norris and Simon Grant 30 The Agony and the Ecstasy Guy Peploe and Toby Hogarth 34 Gwen John & Celia Paul Dr Rowan Williams 38 Bobby Baker: Dear Diary Emma Robertson 42 Practical Alchemy Simon Martin 47 A Legacy for All Stefan van Raay and Kate Mosse
Friends 52 53 55
Chairman's Letter Friends' Events Gallery Club
Regulars 9 13 16 56 63 64
Director's Letter Exhibitions Diary News What's On: Talks Pallant Photos Collection in Focus: Reserved Table
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Contributors Editorial Editor Emma Robertson, e.robertson@pallant.org.uk Sub Editor Beth Funnell Editorial Assistant Christine Couldwell Gallery Editorial Simon Martin, Katy Norris Stefan van Raay, Emma Robertson, Marc Steene Guest Editorial Susie Allen, Bobby Baker, Nikki Bell, Roger Cardinal, Simon Grant, Tony Heaton, Toby Hogarth, Ben Langlands, MJ Long, John Maizels, Joanna Moorhead, Kate Mosse, Guy Peploe, James Thompson, Dr Rowan Williams Friends' Editorial Lady Nicholas Gordon Lennox, Jillie Moss Design, Editing and Production David Wynn
With thanks Outside In Supporters
Jean Dubuffet Supporters
Headline Sponsor of the Gallery 2012
Franck & Catherine Petitgas Annoushka Eykyn Maclean Dubuffet Supporters' Circle Gwen John and Celia Paul Supporters
7229(<¶6 $17,48( ),1( $57 $8&7,21((56
Advertising Booking and General Enquiries Paolo Russo +44 (0)207 300 5751 Kim Jenner +44 (0)207 300 5658 Jane Grylls +44 (0)207 300 5661
PALLANT HOUSE GALLERY Friends
Gallery Information Pallant House Gallery, 9 North Pallant, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 1TJ, UK +44 (0)1243 774557; info@pallant.org.uk www.pallant.org.uk Opening Times Monday Tuesday–Saturday Thursday Sunday/Bank Holidays
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Friends' Office Events +44 (0)1243 770816 friendsevents@pallant.org.uk Membership +44 (0)1243 770815 friends@pallant.org.uk Bookshop www.pallantbookshop.com; shop@pallantbookshop.com +44 (0)1243 781293 Field & Fork at Pallant House Gallery www.fieldandfork.co.uk; Reservations +44 (0)1243 770827 6
Willard Conservation Limited, The Priory and Poling Charitable Trusts, The Garfield Weston Foundation, and other Trusts, Foundations and anonymous benefactors. Pallant House Gallery makes every effort to seek permission of copyright owners for images reproduced in this publication. If however, a work has not been correctly identified or credited and you are the copyright holder, or know of the copyright holder, please contact the editor.
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K E I T H VA U G H A N An exhibition of Paintings and Gouaches 8 NOVEMBER â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 1 DECEMBER 2012
Exhibition catalogue available To commemorate the centenary of Keith Vaughanâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s birth a new monograph, published by Lund Humphries in association with Osborne Samuel will be launched during the exhibition. For more information about the exhibition please contact the gallery or email: bchhohan@osbornesamuel.com 8
Lagoon with Bathers, 1948. Oil on canvas. 41 x 51 cm (16 x 20 in)
23a Bruton Street London W1J 6QG Tel: 020 7493 7939 info@osbornesamuel.com www.osbornesamuel.com
Director's Letter
R.B. Kitaj, The Architects, 1981, Oil on canvas, Pallant House Gallery (Wilson Loan, 2006) Š Estate of R B Kitaj
In 2007, when the judges awarded Pallant House Gallery the Gulbenkian Prize, they described it as a 'jewel of a Gallery'. It is, I think, a fitting way to describe the place that I have seen grow and develop during my time as Director. After 15 years I still feel passionately about the Gallery and the people involved in it, and it is with a tinge of melancholy that I say goodbye (see interview on p.47). My final season reflects perfectly the Gallery's position as a place where British Modern and Contemporary art meets the world. There has always been a genuine ambition to make the Gallery accessible for all, and one of the ways in which we strive to do so is through the work of the Learning and Community programmes. Outside In is one of our flagship projects, giving a platform to artists who would not usually have the chance to exhibit in a major gallery, and supporting them to develop and flourish. It is a sign of our commitment to this ambition that Outside In: National will be shown in the main exhibition spaces this season. Marc Steene, founder of the project, introduces the exhibition (p.18), ahead of a short history of 'marginal art' by John Maizels (p.22) and an interview with Outside In judge, Bobby Baker (p.38). Throughout his life the French artist Jean Dubuffet sought out non-professional artists which he perceived to be 'unscathed by artistic culture' and so it is fitting that a display of his work will be shown alongside Outside In: National. Katy Norris introduces the exhibition (p.26) and Simon Grant, Editor of Tate Etc,
discusses the public's reaction to his work (p.28). The Scottish artist, Pat Douthwaite, exhibited frequently during her lifetime, though she often identified herself with the fringes of the art world as her emotionally intense paintings and uncompromising vision set her apart from the establishment. Guy Peploe introduces a show in the De'Longhi Print Room (p.30) while her son, Toby Hogarth, describes his personal perspective on his mother and her work (p.32). Douthwaite painted several series of female figures during her lifetime. Appropriately, a new show in Rooms 4 and 5 showcases one of them - Gwen John - whose work can be seen alongside the painter Celia Paul. Though they were born decades apart their lives share many common threads. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, explores the parallels (p. 34). As well as our thriving temporary exhibition programme Pallant House Gallery is celebrated for its 'collection of collections', a series of personal gifts that have been generously bestowed over the years. Mark Golder and Brian Thompson have contributed to the collection of contemporary prints for a decade in a unique model of giving. This year, to celebrate 30 years of Pallant House Gallery, they have donated a collection of 30 ceramics. Simon Martin gives thanks for the addition (p.42). Finally, I want to thank my colleagues, the Trustees, the Friends, and all who have supported the Gallery in the last 15 years. I hope you will continue to enjoy the Gallery and its programme for many years to come. 9
De'Longhi holds exclusive preview at Pallant House Gallery
Maggi Hambling, Little Night Wave, 2012, Oil on board
Gillian Wearing, Lily Cole, 2009, C-Type framed photograph printed on Matt Fuji Crystal Archive paper
Enjoying its fourth year of sponsorship of Pallant House Gallery, De'Longhi â&#x20AC;&#x201C; the UK's number one Italian coffee machine brand*, continues to invest in the arts and local community.
De'Longhi would like to thank Pallant House Gallery members and visitors for their continued support, without which, the auction would not enjoy its success in raising crucial funds for Macmillan Cancer Support.
Visitors to Pallant House Gallery in September were delighted by a unique exhibition from the successful 2012 Macmillan De'Longhi Art Auction, where they were able to see a sneak-preview of some special works of art whilst sampling fresh coffee provided by the De'Longhi team.
De'Longhi will continue to contribute to the work of the Gallery for the remainder of 2012, and Pallant House Gallery visitors can also look forward to the opportunity to sample a De'Longhi coffee at the forthcoming Pallant House Gallery Friends' event on the 28th October.
Fabulous paintings, drawings and photographs, which were donated by a number of high profile artists, were on display at Pallant House Gallery from names including Bill Brandt, Gillian Wearing, Maggi Hambling, Sam Taylor Wood and Stuart Semple. Donated pieces on display were just a sample from the 60 artworks which went under the hammer at the Royal College of Art on Tuesday 25th September.
For more information about De'Longhi visit www.seriousaboutcoffee.co.uk
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*GFK July 2012
Visitors enjoy advanced viewing of high profile artworks ahead of charity art auction at the Royal College of Art
Š Gilbert Garcin
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Arden and Anstruther The Barn, Daymans, Bedham, Pulborough, W. Sussex RH20 1JR
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Olivia Musgrave â&#x20AC;&#x201D; The Fates 12 October â&#x20AC;&#x201C; 3 November 2012
John Martin Gallery 38 Albemarle Street London, W1S 4 JG
T +44 (0)20 7499 1314 info@jmlondon.com
catalogue available www.jmlondon.com Amazon Smelling a Rose, bronze, Private Collection Ireland
Exhibitions Diary
Gwen John, A Corner of the Artist's Room in Paris (1907–1909), oil on canvas © Museums Sheffield
Gwen John and Celia Paul: Painters in Parallel 6 October 2012 – 27 January 2013 Though separated by over 80 years, the lives and work of Gwen John (1876–1939) and Celia Paul (b.1959) share many fascinating parallels. Both were students at the Slade School of Art and models and muses to internationally famous male artists (Auguste Rodin and Lucian Freud) and each has expressed a strongly personal vision that reflects their identity as a woman artist. This exhibition includes key examples of paintings and drawings by both artists, placed sideby-side for the first time, offering a unique insight into the common experiences and themes which bridge almost eight decades of history. Main Galleries 4 and 5 Outside In: National 27 October 2012 – 3 February 2013 The ground-breaking triennial open entry exhibition for artists producing work from the margins of society returns to Pallant House Gallery. The exhibition will showcase around 80 works selected from pieces submitted to the Outside In: National competition over the past year. From substance misusers to self-taught visionaries, the exhibition will provide a unique insight into the extraordinary breadth and vitality of work produced by individuals from outside the mainstream art world. Main Galleries 12–14
Jean Dubuffet: Transitions 20 October 2012 – 3 February 2013 Jean Dubuffet (1901–1985) is best known as the father of Art Brut. Throughout his life he sought out non-professional or self-taught artists that he perceived to be 'unscathed by artistic culture', creating an extensive Art Brut collection in 1945. This exhibition of his paintings, drawings and sculpture will be the first major review of Dubuffet's work in a public museum in the UK for nearly 50 years. It has been organised with the assistance of the Fondation Dubuffet, Paris and will feature key loans from collections across the UK. Main Galleries 15, 16 and 17 Pat Douthwaite: An Uncompromising Vision 23 October 2012 – 3 February 2013 An exhibition of the idiosyncratic work of Pat Douthwaite (1934–2002). A glamorous maverick character, Douthwaite is often associated with Outsider Art although she exhibited regularly in her lifetime. Self-taught as an artist, she attended classes in mime and modern dance with Margaret Morris, who encouraged her to paint. A troubled personality, in later years Douthwaite struggled with illness and disability, having sustained back injuries from a brutal attack in Edinburgh. This exhibition focuses on her prints and drawings including her 1983 painting of 'Gwen John in Paris'. De' Longhi Print Room Bouke de Vries: Bow Selector until July 2013 A new ceramic installation by contemporary artist Bouke de Vries commissioned by Pallant House Gallery to mark the 300th anniversary of the historic house. Lining the walls of the carved wooden staircase, Bow Selector has been constructed from the Gallery's Geoffrey Freeman Collection of Bow porcelain and makes a playful nod to the celebrated porcelain displays of Daniel Marot. Main Galleries: Stairwell 13
Exhibitions Diary
Studio Outside In: Step Up 23 October – 2 December 2012 A chance to find out more about the Step Up project through photographs of workshops, feedback from participants, examples of research and case studies charting individual journeys. Chichester Decorative and Fine Art Society Schools Competition 4 December 2012 – 6 January 2013 The return of the schools competition organised by the Chichester Decorative Fine Arts Society (CDFAS) in collaboration with Pallant House Gallery which this year takes the theme of light. Roy Anderson: All is Mortal 8 – 27 January 2013 The first public exhibition of Outside In artist Roy Anderson's work produced in a period of creative intensity and stored in his garage for 50 years. Volunteering in Action 29 January – 10 February 2013 An exhibition of photographs produced as part of the volunteering competition organised by the Chichester & District Volunteer Centre and Pallant House Gallery celebrating volunteering within the Chichester District. A Decade of Partners in Art 12 February – 10 March 2013 An anniversary exhibition celebrating Pallant House Gallery's award-winning scheme and all the people who have been involved in it. 14
R.B. Kitaj, Priest, Deckchair and Distraught Woman, 1961, Oil on canvas, Pallant House Gallery (Wilson Gift through The Art Fund, 2006) © The Estate of R.B. Kitaj
coming soon R.B. Kitaj: Obsessions 23 February – 16 June 2013 R. B. Kitaj (1932–2007) was one of the most significant painters of the post-war period. His figurative work defied the trend in abstract art prevalent in the 1960s and brought him to the forefront of British figurative painting. Featuring over 50 major paintings, sketches and prints from the 1960s to his death in 2007, this exhibition is the only UK showing of the major Berlin retrospective. Shown concurrently between the Jewish Museum London and Pallant House Gallery, the presentation of the exhibition over two venues will enable different facets of his identity to be explored in depth for the first time in the UK. Barbara Hepworth: The Hospital Drawings 16 February – 2 June 2013 In the late 1940s Barbara Hepworth embarked on a series of studies of the operating theatre at the invitation of her friend, the surgeon Norman Capener. The remarkable drawings demonstrate Hepworth's consummate skill as a draftsperson and the synergy she felt between her work as a sculptor and the surgeon's craft. This exhibition of over 30 drawings comes to Pallant House Gallery as part of a three venue tour.
Modern British & Irish Art and Prints featuring the St. Ives School Knightsbridge, London We are currently accepting consignments for our forthcoming Modern British and Irish Art sale and our Prints sale featuring the St. Ives School Modern British & Irish Art 5 March 2013 +44 (0) 20 7393 3949 emma.corke@bonhams.com
Prints 20 February 2013 +44 (0) 20 7393 3941 tanya.grigoroglou@bonhams.com
Patrick Heron (British, 1920-1999) January 3: 1983: II (detail) gouache ÂŁ7,000 - 10,000
International Auctioneers and Valuers â&#x20AC;&#x201C; bonhams.com
news
© Jason Hedges
thanks a million Pallant House Gallery has been successfully granted £1m match funding through the new Catalyst Endowments funding programme, a joint initiative between the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, Arts Council England and the Heritage Lottery Fund. Designed to bring new money into the cultural sector, the Catalyst Endowment programme offers match funding to help arts and heritage organisations secure their financial stability by building a new endowment fund or developing an existing one. The grant is conditional on Pallant House Gallery matching it with funding from private giving over the next four years. The Gallery now has to raise £1m by 2016 in order to receive the grant. smells like team spirit Pallant House Gallery has joined forces with Chichester Volunteer Centre and Chichester District Council to challenge residents to capture the spirit of volunteering in a photograph. The competition, called Volunteering in Action, aims to create a library of local images which capture this spirit and inspire and engage future volunteers. Pallant House Gallery alone has over 300 volunteers in a variety of crucial roles and activities, from room stewarding to providing longterm assistance to individuals through the Partners in Art programme. The winning photographs will be displayed in an exhibition in the Studio from 28 January to 10 February 2013. For more information about the exhibition or becoming a volunteer go to pallant.org.uk.
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Peter Blake POPS to The Lowry The Financial Times called it 'hugely enjoyable', the Sunday Times called it 'unmissable' and the Independent on Sunday fell in love with the 'accidental star of the show' - the Princess Jukebox. Those who were unlucky enough to miss Pallant House Gallery's summer show, Peter Blake and Pop Music, will have another chance to see it when it travels to The Lowry this winter. The exhibition, which celebrates the 80th birthday of the Godfather of Pop Art, is to be sprinkled with rock stardust by Alison Goldfrapp, the venue's first Performer as Curator. It will be on view from November 2012 to February 2013. win a solo show at pallant house gallery Pallant House Gallery and St Wilfrid's Hospice, Chichester are joining together to mount a prestigious new artists' award to help raise funds for the two charities. Both organisations receive only a small share of their income through public funding so the award will be a valuable opportunity for artists to provide support whilst benefiting from a unique opportunity to gain exposure in an internationallyrenowned gallery. The new look artists' awards will culminate in an exhibition of around 40 works at Pallant House Gallery in July 2013 chosen by a panel of selectors. Prizes will include the chance to have a solo show in the Studio of Pallant House Gallery in 2014. The competition is open to artists of all ages and the cost of entry is £20 (concessions £10) per piece. For more information go to pallant.org.uk
The Grosvenor School & Avant-Garde British Printmaking Tuesday 26 February 2013 New Bond Street, London
Bonhams is currently accepting consignments for an exciting landmark sale dedicated to the Grosvenor School and Avant-Garde British printmaking of the early 20th century. +44 (0) 20 7468 8262 rupert.worrall@bonhams.com
Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson A.R.A. (British, 1889-1946) Banking at 4000 feet Signed and numbered 17/200 402 x 316mm ÂŁ50,000 - 70,000
International Auctioneers and Valuers â&#x20AC;&#x201C; bonhams.com/prints 17
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Bringing the Outside In Marc Steene, Deputy Director of Pallant House Gallery, heralds the arrival of the Outside In: National with an impassioned homage to non-traditional creativity
As the director of Outside In and one of the selectors for this year's National competition I am in a unique and privileged position to have had an overview of the work of over a thousand artists, most of who may never have exhibited or shared their work before. The artwork produced by these artists is some of the most powerful and beautiful I have seen in recent years, refreshing in its lack of pretension and moving in its ability to communicate a wide range of life experiences and emotions. Over 25 years ago I stumbled across a group of learning-disabled artists in a day centre in Hove and my life changed forever. I was at a low point as an artist; I had grown disillusioned with the art world and had recently been through a period of mental ill health, partly brought about by the pressure of having to sell my work in the hard-nosed commercial art world. I was trained at the Slade and, having an Italian mother passionate about art, was introduced to the great works of the Masters at an early age. I had a thorough understanding of the Renaissance and the methodology of art historical thinking, but none of this prepared me for the work of the artists I met in that day centre. There was Elsie, endlessly painting fields of the most beautiful flowers into which one could walk and escape to a life of seemingly eternal bliss; David, expressing his pain and pride by creating Jesus in his own image with three fingers on each hand, nailed to a cross; and Keith, an angry young man whose paintings had a tribal and physical intensity. Three of the many I could recount, all uniquely talented. Fin, Shadow, Š the artist
What I found most shocking and upsetting at the time was the creative abuse and neglect many of these artists had suffered, the decades without encouragement and understanding. Ironically, looking back, what was also equally noticeable was the way in which, despite the neglect, their creativity had not died but had grown and shone even brighter. Where others might have tried to step in to teach and advise, or give them works to copy and colour in, they had been left to their own devices, allowing them to maintain an innocence and close relationship to their creativity. My experiences at that day centre have in one way or another, shaped the rest of my life. They have led to the creation of Outside In and underpin many of the values and thinking behind the Learning and Community programme at the Gallery. What has always interested and moved me in my work with non-traditional artists is seeing how creative endeavour can have a purpose and aesthetic outside of conventional attitudes to art and its function as a commodity in our market-based society. Artists from the margins often seem to have maintained a close relationship to their creativity; it has honesty and integrity, commodities rarely seen in our cynical and increasingly conceptual art world. Their work often serves a purpose and function closely aligned to their individual needs. This can mean that their work can serve as a tool for self-discovery, healing or for manifesting personal obsessions. Sometimes it can be used to express life situations and circumstances, 19
Georges Limbour and Jean Dubuffet, Farley Farm House, Sussex, England 1955 by Lee Miller Š Lee Miller Archives, England 2012. All rights reserved. www.leemiller.co.uk
act as a catharsis, create a world of peace and calm to escape to, or help release inner demons. It can sometimes be, as in the work of artists with learning disabilities, an intuitive process driven by a person's innate aesthetic and creativity. What is clear is how different this is to what is commonly taught in today's art schools as artistic practice, exhibited and sold in commercial galleries, discussed in art journals or taught on art history courses. There is an attraction and growing market for art that has sidestepped the conventions of what the art world presents as art. Value and quality is totally subjective; when people are released from the fear of not understanding what art is they are then free to choose what it is they like and acquire work that communicates to them directly on an emotional and aesthetic level - values that work by non-traditional artists has in abundance. At its heart the impact of Outside In and the values it carries is a liberating influence for both the artists and, most importantly, the audience - allowing a broader discourse, wider participation in the art world, and for art and creativity to take its place at the heart of our communities. Freed from convention, many of the artists that Outside In engages with have circumvented traditional art processes and techniques, often evolving highly personal ways of working. Artists such as Neil Pearce produce work that seeks to explore life through a personal codex, a series of symbols that will at some point reveal the mystery of the universe. Ronald, produces work that is life-giving, often consisting 20
of kidneys, hearts and other gifts that he bestows as blessings to friends, the police and other people in his life, believing entirely in the power of his art to change and benefit lives. I love the purpose to which Ronald uses his art, bypassing commodity and any art world context. Similarly the artist Ben Wilson's chewing gum pictures on the pavements of London, often commissioned to commemorate various events in people's lives (a centenary, birthday or other significant personal event) is non-commercial. His work acts as a way of recording and celebrating the seemingly insignificant milestones in life, making them into art. These artists are fulfilling different roles in society. Some use their art as shamans, creating spells to ward off evil spirits or to bring blessings; others as modern day diarists - recorders of their inner and outer worlds. I would like to believe that one day we can live in a society where there are as many ways of creating as there are individuals. A world where art has integrity and purpose, where everyone has the opportunity to grow, discover and learn about themselves; where they can develop their own aesthetic, uncowed by convention or other people's opinions. Unless we aspire to an art world where the benefits are shared more equally then I believe Outside In and society as a whole will have failed. Creativity is one of the most powerful tools we have at our fingertips and everyone should have the right to use it. This is the third time Outside In has offered the opportunity to artists from the margins to have their work on display in Pallant House Gallery- now a triennial- and for the first time it will be in the main exhibition spaces. These works and artists are being given the due value and prominence that they and their work deserve. From the deeply spiritual to the darkest of visions, from the achingly sad to the sharply acerbic Outside In: National will provide audiences with an exhibition that explores the full range of human emotions - a must-see for all those curious about art, life and the human spirit. Outside In: National is in is in galleries 12â&#x20AC;&#x201C;14 (27 Oct 2012 to 3 Feb 2013). Six award winners have been chosen from the entrants to have a solo exhibition in the Studio by a panel of judges (Bobby Baker, Roger Cardinal and Stefan van Raay). During the exhibition, there will be an audio trail throughout the Galleries, highlighting research into the Collection by Outside In artists (64). A full events programme accompanies the exhibitions (p.56). For more information go to www.pallant.org.uk and www.outsidein.org.uk Regina Lafay, Convert Š the artist
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Outsider Art and Beyond
John Maizels, Editor of Raw Vision, takes a whistle stop tour through the rich history of Outsider and visionary art and over the page two 'marginal art' enthusiasts reflect on its appeal
Origins: Art from the asylum The first inkling of the existence of Outsider Art emerged from the work of a few enlightened psychiatrists in the mid and late nineteenth century. Gradually it became clear that a few psychiatric patients were spontaneously producing artworks - often on found scraps of paper - of unusual quality and power. By 1922 Dr Hans Prinzhorn in Germany published the first serious study of psychiatric works, The Artistry of the Insane, after amassing a collection of several thousands of examples from German-speaking institutions around Europe. Both book and collection received considerable attention from avant-garde artists of the time and the influence on such figures as Franz Marc, Paul Klee, Max Ernst and Jean Dubuffet has been much documented. They were fascinated and inspired by an art that was produced without any influences from the modern art world yet seemed highly original, compelling and contemporary. At the same time Dr Walter Morgenthaler published the first study of a single psychiatric patient's work, Adolf Wölfli, a patient at his Swiss asylum. Wölfli worked for thirty years in a small cell producing huge drawings which he bound in vast tomes accompanied by a dense script recounting his exploits and calculations, a depiction of a whole alternative reality from his tragic life. Art Brut and Dubuffet It was Jean Dubuffet who realised that spontaneous, original and uninfluenced creation was not just the Henry Darger, At Jennie Ritchee - Narrowly escape capture when attacked by Glandelinians (detail) c.1940s - 60s, Private Collection © the artist
preserve of the mentally ill. Shortly after the end of WWII he embarked on a lifetime crusade to collect and study works by all kinds of people who were able to work in this way. None were professional artists or had contact with the art world and all were completely untrained. They included mediums, isolates and fierce individualists as well as psychiatric patients. For the first time a name was given to this genre, Art Brut. By this Dubuffet meant art that was 'uncooked' by culture - an art that was at its most pure, its most powerful and its most meaningful. It was an art produced entirely for individual satisfaction and inner need with no regard to exhibition, fame or monetary reward. Dubuffet's collection eventually numbered over 30,000 pieces and in 1979 was established at the now famous Collection de l'Art Brut museum in Lausanne, Switzerland. Outsider Art in England As knowledge and awareness of Art Brut spread so did its parameters and the first study in English by Roger Cardinal, appearing in 1972, presented the term Outsider Art as an English version of Art Brut. Cardinal's book investigated a body of work which had never previously been considered together. He drew parallels between the early psychiatric collections, the Collection de L'Art Brut and the environmental creations which were gaining recognition on both sides of the Atlantic. Over the years Outsider Art has moved further away from being an exact synonym of Art Brut. 23
The view across the Atlantic There were soon major discoveries made in the United States too, with the work of the reclusive Henry Darger only coming to light close to his death in 1973. His one-room lodging was found to reveal his work of the previous 30 years: almost 100 large scale drawings depicting epic battles between cruel soldiers and brave children who suffer terrible ordeals, accompanied by a text so long that it would take many years to read it all. Meanwhile, the economical drawings of ex-slave Bill Traylor and the striking visual sermons of Rev Howard Finster also found ready acclaim in the USA, as did the work of patient Martin Ramirez. One of the few great American discoveries with a hospital background, Martin Ramirez, was found by his doctor to be hiding bits of drawings in his clothes to prevent the usual daily clear-out of what was considered rubbish. After being given proper materials and allowed to preserve his work, he went on to produce a huge quantity of work based on both a depiction and an abstraction of his Mexican background and culture. A recent discovery of almost 150 unknown works by Ramirez in a California garage caused a sensation. Self-taught and Environmental Art The discovery of large-scale environmental works by self-taught builders and sculptors has also been very significant. AndrĂŠ Breton was photographed at the massive structure built by country postman Ferdinand Cheval in southern France, the Palais IdĂŠal, the first of many discoveries of sculptural and architectural creations of 'ordinary geniuses'. Since the saving of the Simon Rodia's Watts Towers in Los Angeles in 1958 hundreds of similar creations have been found around the United States and France too has many extraordinary examples. Sculpture gardens and fantastical self-built structures have been found across the world with the greatest and largest being Nek Chand's Rock Garden in Chandigarh, northern India. Thousands of sculptures are set in a 25 acre complex of courtyards, colonnades, walkways and landscaped waterfalls, with the main materials being industrial and natural waste, collected on a huge scale. Art Therapy In a parallel development to the awareness of Art Brut that developed from the mid 1940s onwards, art therapy gradually became an important part of patient activity. In Britain it was largely initiated by the pioneering work of Edward Adamson. Art therapy was initially presented as a mainly teacher-led activity 24
to benefit the mental state of patients and to offer insights into their condition. In Austria psychiatrist Dr Leo Navratil used patients' drawings to help diagnose the changes in their condition but he realised that some were exceptionally talented and original and changed his approach to encourage them just to create without any need for diagnostic analysis. Navritil eventually established the Haus der KĂźnstler (Artists' House) within the grounds of the hospital in Gugging, Austria, where he worked. Here the artist-patients lived together and concentrated their time and energies in creative activity. Several of these patients, including Johann Hauser, August Walla and Oswald Tschirtner, became celebrated artists in their own right, represented in museums. Contemporary thinking In the last two decades many new studios and workshops have been established on both sides of the Atlantic to offer patients and ex-patients the opportunity to freely work in supported conditions. Some workshops also offer facilities to the homeless or unemployed as well as those with disabilities. As a result the boundaries of Outsider Art move ever wider and more inclusive, with the background of the artist as someone marginalised by society being an important element in their recognition. Human creativity is a basic urge as Prinzhorn emphasised many years ago. In certain individuals it will inevitably surface and nothing can stop it. Yet there have been profound changes in both the perceptions and the actualities of non-academic art since Dubuffet's reasoning. Outsider Art has now established itself as a vibrant component of contemporary art with large-scale collections and museums on both sides of the Atlantic. Although the self-taught artists of today cannot be as culturally isolated as many in Dubuffet's great collection, they still prove to be as compulsive, inventive and self-motivated as ever. John Maizels is the Editor of Raw Vision magazine and the author of the Outsider Art Sourcebook, a comprehensive international guide to Outsider Art. www.rawvision-uk.com. Roger Cardinal will give a talk on the Marginal Arts at Pallant House Gallery on Thursday 29 November, 6pm (p.56). www.pallant.org.uk.
Perspectives the marginal arts
Adolf Wolfli, Skt. Adolf-Diamantt-Ring, 1913 Adolf WÜlfli Foundation, Kunstmuseum, Bern. Š the artist
Tony Heaton, CEO Shape (Outside in selector) One of the conundrums of art history is how many outsiders are now inside and instantly recognisable, Van Gogh, Modigliani, Toulouse-Lautrec, Richard Dadd, Alfred Wallis. The mainstream of the time swept past them, hardly daring to look. Contemporary Outsider and Disability Arts rarely make an appearance in galleries, nor are they written about by art critics who come from such a different place that they are often unable to appreciate this work, having not the experience nor vocabulary to discuss it beyond the phenomena of difference or disability - by that I mean impairment. These critics obsess with the overcoming of our impairments and when they have written about that, they then struggle to say anything meaningful about the work we do. It is telling that there is only one regular comprehensive on-line journal, created in England but with a world-wide audience: DAO (Disability Arts On-line), unique in the world but amazingly without secure funding. Similarly, Raw Vision remains the world's only international journal for Outsider Art. This art may be described as at the margins but it is not marginal for me; it is fundamental, if unpredictable. It is not always packaged and sanitised by the gallery machine; you have to search for it. I am looking for dangerous, sexy, puzzling, provoking; is that what is channelled through the mainstream? I don't think so. I am looking in the rock pools, on the tide line, under stones; I want the interesting things that are washed up on to the beach.
Roger Cardinal, Art critic (outside in judge) The beauty of Outsider Art is that it confounds conventional aesthetics. Flourishing in blithe disregard of the stipulations of pundits and pedants, it wriggles out of the clutches of definition at the same time as it imposes its own priorities. I am referring to a species of art which thrives upon its resistance to normative description, a feral art which prowls along the margins and whose adaptation to the prevailing cultural imperative is minimal. This first step towards understanding takes us across vexed theoretical territory, but it is important not to dawdle. For what we now need to do is to take a second step and, letting go of the handholds of definition and classification, to engage directly with the visible expressions of Outsider Art itself, in all their resplendent and even terrifying immediacy. We can be sure that the best examples of Outsider Art (and no doubt the best of art at large) will solicit our engagement at this profound level and that their visual or tactile configurations are the permanent record of emotional and spiritual states, as well as a guarantee of their actuality. For even fantasies take their place within the totality of existence, and dreams are no less part of the human project. The Romantic poet Novalis once wrote that, 'genius is the capacity to address imagined objects as well as real ones, and to handle them in the self same way.' In embracing the untamed beauty of Outsider Art, we may be surprised to discover that genius within ourselves. 25
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The father of art brut Katy Norris, Curatorial Assistant, explores the complex and intricate world of Jean Dubuffet, and Simon Grant, Editor of Tate Etc, examines the historical context of his 1961 work 'Vire-Volte'
Writing in reference to his 'Hourloupe' series in 1963, Jean Dubuffet likened the process of creation to swimming upstream. Similarly Dubuffet's career might be defined in terms of swimming against the current, a continual struggle to upset convention and reverse what was commonly held to be the natural flow of things. Born to a respectable family in Le Havre in Northern France, he broke with his bourgeois upbringing to study at the Académie Julian in Paris, only to make a dramatic U-turn in becoming a prosperous wine merchant. When he finally committed to being an artist at the age of 41 Dubuffet sought to unlearn everything he knew. The experimental paintings, drawings and sculptures that he produced after this point were created with deliberate disregard for his academic training. Often radically different in style and technique they stemmed from an ambition to reinvent art and continually revise the methods of its production. As Dubuffet proclaimed, "A painting does not work for me if it is not completely unexpected…. I feel a need that every work of art should in the highest degree lift one out of context, provoking a surprise and a shock". Dubuffet's anarchistic, essentially anti-cultural, viewpoint was also the premise for his concept of Art Brut coined in 1945. Around this time he began amassing a vast collection of works by marginalised and self-trained people. The inherent inventiveness and raw quality of the artworks he discovered appealed to Dubuffet instinctively, yet he was equally compelled by the makers themselves. Their lives were Jean Dubuffet, Tasse de The VII © ADAGP, Paris and DACS, London 2012
distinguished by a complete lack of social integration which, in Dubuffet's eyes, rendered them unscathed by artistic culture. As interest towards the collection increased Dubuffet tirelessly defended this unique social position, setting up the Compagnie de L'Art Brut in 1948 and inaugurating an independent space to display the collection. Having previously been exhibited at the Foyer de L'Art Brut secreted in the basement of the Galerie René Drouin, the collection was transferred to a building behind the offices of the Gallimard publishing house. This location was equally private and under the direction of the curator Slavko Kopac, described by Dubuffet as a 'discreet, solitary and ferocious man', the Gallimard pavillion became a centre for the study of Art Brut. Meanwhile the creators of Art Brut were given a level of anonymity, being referred to as 'authors' in order to differentiate them from professional artists that could be described as inside culture. Given the strict barriers Dubuffet put up around the collection, it is not surprising that he also viewed his dual-role as artist and keeper of Art Brut as separate entities. From his extensive commentary on the subject it is clear that he saw little crossover with his own artwork, although he recognised that he took example from the authors' visionary freedom. As a cultured and educated man Dubuffet could never be described as an Art Brut artist, but his personal adherence to solitary creation and individual expression was certainly affirmed by his engagement with marginalised artists. 27
Lee Miller, 'Georges Limbour and Jean Dubuffet, Farley Farm House, Sussex, England 1955' © Lee Miller Archives, England 2012. All rights reserved. www.leemiller.co.uk
At times it seemed the proximity of the collection had even greater impact. By Dubuffet's own admission he was incredibly receptive to the aesthetic intricacies of Art Brut. Generally more self-referential than conventional art, this periodically threatened to encroach upon the originality of his productions. Writing to his dealer Pierre Matisse in 1951 Dubuffet stated, 'I no longer want to allow myself to be consumed by this enterprise as I have the past year, I want to concern myself with my own painting, and … to drown in a little peaceful tranquillity." Shortly afterwards Dubuffet took the decision to ship his entire holdings of Art Brut to a private estate in New York. The collection spent the rest of the decade on the opposite side of the Atlantic under the care of his friend, the painter Alfonso Ossorio whilst Dubuffet focused on pushing forward developments in his own painting. The exhibition at Pallant House Gallery picks up the narrative just prior to the return of the collection to Paris in 1962. That summer Dubuffet created a sequence of automatic drawings whilst speaking on the telephone, which he made into a book entitled 'L' Hourloupe'. Loosely depicting such seemingly arbitrary and unrelated subjects as a coffee pot, cow, mosquito and umbrella the gesticulating forms borrowed their jaunty attitude from the caricatures of the 'Paris Circus', Dubuffet's last major series of paintings which had occupied him throughout the previous year. In all other respects however these extraordinary drawings marked a radical change. Whereas 'Paris Circus' had been concerned with the concrete image of the city, the continuous linear patterns now possessed an altogether more abstract quality, being cellular in structure like twisting strands
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of DNA or embryonic amoebas. No longer interested in outward appearance the subject of 'L' Hourloupe' was the structure of objects as perceived in Dubuffet's memory. The invented word 'L'Hourloupe' was a product of his furtive imagination, being closest to the French saying 'l'entourloupette' (to make a fool of), but also containing the title of the novel 'Le Horla' by the writer Guy de Maupassant. Meaning 'the one outside' and exploring a person's descent into madness, the reference to Maupassant's story highlights both Dubuffet's intellectual sophistication, his ability to communicate with the literary circles which he was from, and his identification with people who were considered to hold an irrational or disturbed sense of reality. As Lawrence Alloway observed in 1966, the Hourloupe recalled the 'clenched order of the schizophrenic artist… a turning away from the world, and a fantastic alternative to where we are now' . This sudden move towards an exploration of introverted thought processes can be directly linked to Dubuffet's renewed engagement with Art Brut. As early as 1959 he had begun prospecting again, this time with the dealer Alphonse Chave and focusing on the region around his home in Vence. Although the project proved somewhat fruitless his interest in Art Brut had been incurably restored. Three years later, amidst plans to recoup the collection from Ossorio, Dubuffet created the first 'Hourloupe' drawings. The designs became the blueprint for his longest and most ambitious series, through which Dubuffet achieved the level of artistic freedom that he had so admired in the authors of Art Brut.
Simon Grant on vire-volte, 1961 Two raggedy lines of childlike figures wearing hats stand opposite each other across a river of grey. Some look scared, some bemused, some horrified and some vacant. Who are they, where are they, and what are they doing? At the top of the picture a row of barely discernible shop fronts gives a clue, but these don't seem like ordinary shops. Their names are odd – 'The Ghost Society', 'The Reprimand', 'Au Desastre', 'Knick-Knacks'. Is this place real, is it imaginary or is it a memory? Dubuffet painted this picture after a longing to return to Paris city life. He knew the place well, but as the painting's title suggests, he was overwhelmed by its energy and painted it as if it was his first visit. It is one of many paintings he did that are part of the
Jean Dubuffet, Spinning Around (vire-volte), 1961 © ADAGP, Paris and DACS, London 2012
'Paris Circus' series, but the title is a bit misleading. This is not simply an artist's expressive impression of a place and it is perhaps too easy to be seduced by his style which he termed Art Brut at the end of World War Two. And much has been made of this style emerging from him being inspired by the intuitive art of children whose work he collected, and the art of the insane whose work he admired. As far as Dubuffet was concerned, their art was as equal to that of any artist. "There is no more an art of the mad" he once said, "than there is an art of the dyspeptic, or an art for those with bad knees." However this raw, anti-intellectual, direct approach to his subject matter reflected a deeper existential concern for the uncertain world around him. For Dubuffet the horrors of the Second World War were a recent memory. Like his fellow artists Giacometti, who reduced his thin figures to the point of invisibility, and Jean Fautrier, who laboured over his pitted and scarred bronze heads, Dubuffet channelled this sense of intense collective anxiety into his work. It was, for many in the post-war period, a bleak world in which the clearest sense of things were those that had no sense. As Dubuffet wrote, "When it is mixed with ideas, art becomes oxidised and worthless. Let there be as few ideas as possible!"
It is always important to view Dubuffet's work through the prism of the time within which it was made. 'Spinning Around' was painted in 1961, the year when the Nazi Adolf Eichmann was tried in Jerusalem. It was the year that Russia ignited the space race with Sputnik 9 and the year when John F Kennedy ordered the disastrous invasion of Cuba that led to the missile crisis. And so, this frenetic Paris street scene is less a painting about a street and more about a state of affairs. The art historian Ernst Gombrich once wrote how the context of experiencing Dubuffet's art determined whether we react "with laughter, embarrassment, open hostility – or admiration". When 'Spinning Around' was exhibited as part of Dubuffet's retrospective at Tate in 1966, one imagines the painting elicited all these responses from the audience, perhaps some of whom were unsure just what to think. Now this fascinating painting will be seen by a new audience and in a new context, alongside Pallant House Gallery's companion exhibition Outside In: National. No doubt Dubuffet would have been pleased by the company of these artists. Jean Dubuffet: Transitions is in Room 15–17 (20 Oct 2012 to 3 Feb 2013). Simon Grant is Editor of Tate Etc. His book In My View: Personal Reflections on Art by Today's Leading Artists' is published by Thames & Hudson. 29
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the agony and the ecstasy Guy Peploe, Managing Director of The Scottish Gallery, introduces the uncompromising artistic vision of Pat Douthwaite and her son, Toby Hogarth, offers his personal perspective
It is now ten years since Pat Douthwaite died alone of an overdose of prescription drugs in B&B accommodation in Broughty Ferry. She was 68. We put on a memorial exhibition at the Scottish Gallery in Edinburgh in 2005, and this, alongside the retrospective exhibition we mounted with her collaboration in June 2000, has helped many see the span and variety of her extraordinary career. This current show at Pallant House Gallery will again widen the recognition of one of Scotland's most original and difficult painters. Her work is not easily defined, at once naive and intellectually loaded, personal but resonating with cultural references. It was not made for others but came from that deep-seated need of the creative to make; to express. This said she was not uninterested in what people thought, often drawing an audience into a dangerous dialogue; she was impossible to please and made enemies of her supporters with impunity. Now she has gone and we no longer have Douthwaite to mediate our experience of the work we can perhaps begin a more serious appraisal. But in front of her best work the artist seems still palpably present because she is the real subject of everything she made, in pain, anger or ecstasy. Even now the many cultural impresarios from both public and private parts of the art establishment who were attracted to her to begin with but found her impossible to deal with are wary of her aftermath as if the work carries toxicity. Douglas Hall, the first curator of the SNGMA and a
long-suffering supporter, wrote in the introduction to the 2000 show: "I like to remember Douthwaite as a young woman full of mixed diffidence and hope, embarking on a voyage that was to come near to shipwreck many times. Those of us who came into contact with her, though we may often have had to suck our fingers, have some responsibility along with Douthwaite herself for the fact that she has not had proper recognition of her status as a painter of distinction. On the other hand she would then be like several others. As it is she is unique." We can now easily think of her work as being affected by her bi-polar mental illness but we must be wary of letting this define her. She was not the eternal victim; she fought institutionalisation, was cleverer than anyone charged with her diagnosis and her work is far from the curious outpourings of a patient observed by a Victorian patriarch in Bedlam Hospital. But the work is challenging. In the late fifties there is something owed to Bill Crozier, whom she met in Suffolk, in her restricted palette of red, black and white and in the simplified landscape forms; to Colquhoun and MacBryde as well as the common influences of the School of Paris, Dubuffet in particular. People quickly became her subject, at first the dandies and grotesques, at once Carnaby Street chic and Sohodamaged. This parade of characters was to be replaced by archetypal women (none alive because they would be her natural rivals). She chose Western heroines, like Cattle Kate, or the Scottish witch Isobel Goudie. An
Pat Douthwaite, Gwen John in Paris, 1983, Oil on canvas, The Hepworth, Wakefield, Š The Estate of Pat Douthwaite
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exhibition at The Scottish Gallery in 1977 was devoted to the doomed aviatrix Amy Johnson, and another show with the 369 Gallery for the Edinburgh Festival in 1982 was entitled Worshipped Women and featured an introduction by Robert Graves, who she knew well from her life in Majorca. Her roll-call of monumental single figures was not exclusively distaff; she painted and drew her irascible husband, the graphic artist Paul Hogarth, her exotic friend Lindsay Kemp and demonstrating a keen if jaundiced interest in current events she painted a disturbing series of works inspired by the Manson trial: Charles Manson himself, serenely evil as The Master of Silence (1972) in his orange Californian prison suit. Throughout her life she drew prolifically and honestly and her febrile, nervous line exemplified in her distinctive signature is instantly recognisable. She was a great traveller absorbing imagery and devouring cultures as far afield as Poland, Peru and Mexico and India. Her wanderlust is a tribute to her intellectual curiosity but was at the same time symptomatic of her restlessness and in last ten years of her life she seemed constantly on the move, her world by then restricted to the Borders, and her homes always temporary and her life lived in anxiety. But still she worked, beginning a new love of watercolour which produced some of her most touching imagery, very often of animals - her familiars and the receptacles of love she could not give to others. There is often no happy ending in the life of the creative but Pat Douthwaite is present in her work and meeting her there is as rewarding and challenging as ever it was in her life.
Toby Hogarth, son My mother was non-establishment in every way. She always considered herself an outsider and was quite resentful of that over her lifespan. She could have had more success I think but she was never concerned with doing the right thing and she wasn't interested in being commercial. I remember once when she had just sold a painting she suddenly decided she didn't want the buyers to have it. She went on about it for weeks and finally convinced my father that they should get the picture back so they went around there in the middle of the night and took it. I don't think the owners ever really realised who was responsible!
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Pat Douthwaite, Mary Queen of Scots, 1974, Oil on canvas, Š The Estate of Pat Douthwaite
I think art was a natural therapy for her. She felt best working and depicting her feelings and emotions on canvas or paper. She was totally driven by her work â&#x20AC;&#x201C; it was as if she was completely intertwined with her painting and her drawing. She couldn't live without it. She was always striving for ideas, always turned on to new angles and new projects. She had talent to burn but I think there was a real frustration there that she couldn't do more in her lifetime. People were terribly daunted by her. They didn't know how to handle her. She didn't do what she was told and she got bored and frustrated with people that were not particularly interesting or didn't have much to say. I suppose like us all she appreciated company and affection and interest in her work. She adored animals above humans. I suppose because they gave her undivided affection no matter what. She collected butterflies and beetles and always had a soft spot in her heart for animals of any kind. She became closer to them as life went on because she'd had bad experiences with people. The star of the show for many years when I was a boy was a cocker spaniel called Fagin. It was given to her by the writer Brendan Behan who had a sort of infatuation with her. I grew up with Fagin and we competed for my parents' attention.
Pat Douthwaite, Bentley, Š The Estate of Pat Douthwaite
Music was a huge inspiration, usually very loud abstract classical. She tended to work during the night under pretty wild circumstances. Her work would happen in bursts; it wasn't a regular daily affair. I can remember her crazily painting at night listening to screeching Stockhausen at full volume. My father was much more down to earth, more predictable. He would work in a very different way and I suppose they competed very much, as far as being artists was concerned. They inspired each other but they also competed against each other. When I was about five-years-old we used to draw together. We would lie on the floor for hours on end, messing about with crayons and stuff. She used to almost mimic those juvenile pictures of mine that we'd done years before. I still have some of the notebooks of her ideas, containing little sketches and drawings. She loved dancing and was a great swimmer. When she was young she was very fit and athletic but she went downhill pretty quickly. I think it was probably better that she went out with a bit of a bang; I can't imagine her old and bedridden. She would have hated that.
She loved men but I don't think she entirely trusted them. Her father was quite stern with her and she had two younger brothers that seemed to get the favourite treatment. A lot of her pictures depict female achievers - professionals or theatrical actresses. She painted a series of the aviator Amy Johnson which got her in to a bit of trouble. Johnson's relatives appeared at the private view of one of her shows and they were quite annoyed and upset about the way she had represented her. But it was complimentary; it wasn't meant to be derogatory in any way. Her work never left people indifferent. I think a lot of people couldn't really cope with the intensity in her work â&#x20AC;&#x201C; the sort of wavering acid line, as it has been described. It was pretty terrifying for a lot of people I think. Even when she was just painting a pot, it would be frighteningly alive and with a complete character and sex of its own. It was just incredible. She wasn't your average wife or mother. She was a tremendously talented yet tragic artist. Pat Douthwaite: An Uncompromising Vision is in the De'Longhi Print Room (23 Oct 2012 to 3 Feb 2013).
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gwen john & celia paul Though separated by over 80 years, the lives and work of Gwen John (1876 –1939) and Celia Paul (b.1959) have many fascinating parallels. Both were students at the Slade and models and muses to internationally famous male artists (Auguste Rodin and Lucian Freud) yet, each have maintained a powerfully independent strength of vision in their own painting. As a new exhibition places them side-by-side for the first time, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams (brother-in-law to Celia Paul), reflects on the shared qualities of these two distinctive artists
Celia Paul, My Mother with a Rose, 2006, © Celia Paul courtesy Marlborough Fine Art
Gwen John, Portrait of Mère Marie Poussepin, 1920, Oil on canvas, © Southampton City Art Gallery
When, in the practice of Buddhist meditation, you are given a koan [or riddle] to work with, the point is to bring you to a realisation that there is no final conceptual mastery possible of the situation in which you exist, that all your perceptions are conditioned rather than being 'innocent' ways of seeing things that are there; that there is no position you need to take. One method of working with the koan is simply to go on articulating the responses it generates until there is literally nothing more to say and you acknowledge that there is no resolution, no definitive perspective. It is all too easily misunderstood as a nihilistic or relativistic strategy – nothing is really there; nothing is really true or significant. Any practitioner will agree that this is a travesty. Sitting with the koan is a radical refusal to impose sense, even the sense of saying there is no meaning or truth out there. It is a painful prising open of perception, breaking free of the dualisms that constrain us. And it is something like this that characterises the artists in this exhibition. Yes, they have in common an almost disturbing spareness of style that resonates with some aspects of the Buddhist world; they work with palettes of very fine gradation indeed, ranging over a narrow band, without any easy dramas. But more importantly, they work with their subjects in a profoundly koan-like manner. Gwen John painted an enormous number of pictures of Mere Poussepin – not just because the original idea had been that she should paint a separate picture of the mother foundress for 35
Gwen John, Still Life with Straw Hat, mid 1920s © the artist
each room of the convent, but also because, as she matured as a painter, she increasingly worked over and over again with the same subject matter: the seventeenth century nun, the corner of a working room, later on the girls kneeling in the parish church, the pictures of St Therese and her sister in childhood. In much the same way, Celia Paul revisits, again and again, her mother and her sisters and a few friends and a handful of London views. Many of the specific pictures you will see in this exhibition are in fact something like the slice of living matter that is briefly isolated under a microscope; a moment in a very prolonged process of engagement with a single subject. They are not definitive statements of a vision. This is not quite the same as what we see in a Monet, for example, a compulsion to rework subjects in different lights, at different seasons or times of day. It is a deliberate sitting, as the meditator would put it, with a small range of subject matter, not even differentiated by light, season or whatever and rendering its actuality by the constant questioning of what you think you have just seen. It is a deliberate exhausting of ordinary seeing. The subject matter comes to be charged with unfathomable density as it is shown to generate perception after perception. As 36
with the koan, it is not that this practice leads to an emptying-out of the world; it empties out the greedy and/or tidy-minded looking eye and so allows what is there to unfold more and more deeply. In that sense, it issues in a far fuller world for the viewer/contemplator. Even the single example, looked at in this light, invites a slow and patient engagement. This relates to the paradox that painting, which does not in the least seek for anything like photographic realism in its depiction of faces or settings, has the effect of compelling a recognition of overwhelming life, of some form that flashes in and around the particular moments of fixed gazing represented in any one work. And the narrow palette – both artists in fact work over their careers with a surprisingly broad variety of colour tones, but in particular works, even particular periods, restrict themselves to an ascetically disciplined sliver of the spectrum – intensifies this. Talking about mysteriousness in such a context is a bit of a cliché, too readily suggesting a portentous vagueness or a teasing reticence. It is not the word; but we need something in the same territory for an art that warns us not to suppose we have contained the subject matter in any one perception. The way these two artists achieve this warning is different. Reticence
Celia Paul, Five Sisters, 2009–2010, © Celia Paul courtesy Marlborough Fine Art
is a word that comes to mind in looking at Gwen John, as if the artist is very clearly stepping back; the dusty effect of the brushwork, a seeing as if in a strong light saturated with tiny particles, makes us very conscious of the character of the painting as a surface, rather as in a traditional icon, something formally quite finished, the artist having moved away yet capturing the simple presence of one moment among others. The light itself appears almost as a veiling and so a distancing; a medium that forbids too much false intimacy or immediacy. Celia Paul allows the traces of something unfinished to mark her canvases: trails of paint, untenanted space, a certain rawness of isolation or vulnerability: and this gives to her figures more of a pathos of incompletion; these are faces and figures who are made to be aware in and through the painting of their own painful singleness, of the poignancy of the moment worked with. Returning to the Buddhist comparison, it is as if her subjects are themselves caught up in the sitting, in the koan work; whereas Gwen John's images are more obviously data for the meditating observer. To call this meditative painting is not simply to say that it is quiet and thoughtful – indeed some of Celia Paul's register could not be called quiet if that is
taken to mean emotionally equable. The word applies in a more demanding sense; this is painting that requires concentrated response over time, steadily sifting readings that are too rapid, too facile, too complacent. Meditation in religious tradition – as both these painters are well aware – demands a constant circling around the illusions of the self, a diagnostic watchfulness, a readiness to move away and begin again, aware of what has not yet been seen or said and aware that there will not be a point where everything has been seen or said. And, as we have seen, the effect is not a visual world drained or disenchanted but one that ceaselessly invites any viewer who is prepared to put aside the hunger for drama and acknowledge a hunger for transparency to and for what's there. The life-koan, in fact, as some call it. What we see is a certain stillness; as if only in this unceasing holding and then leaving of deeply particular perceptions of the same perceived object can we encounter what steadily – timelessly if you will – holds them together as an object, as what is given to view. Gwen John and Celia Paul: Painters in Parallel is in Rooms 4 and 5 (6 October 2012 to 27 January 2013). Celia Paul's 'Separation' series is at Chichester Cathedral (6 October to 20 November 2012). 37
dear diary Best known as a performance artist with a penchant for the surreal Bobby Baker's 'Diary drawings' exposed a hidden history of mental illness. She talks to Emma Robertson about the impact of making such intimate drawings public
Emma Robertson The 2009 exhibition 'Bobby Baker's Diary Drawings: Mental Illness and Me' at the Wellcome Collection was a key moment for you to decide to publicly address your mental health experiences, later followed by the book. What made you decide to do so at that point? Bobby BakER Well, I didn't do the drawings in any way to show them to people originally. In fact I hid them as much as I could. I did them entirely for myself and continued to do so the whole way through the eleven years that I was part of the mental health system. But, gradually, I did start to show them to family and friends – and also mental health professionals. The response to the drawings was so positive that I decided to accept the opportunity to exhibit a few of them at Bath University, which ultimately led to the large exhibition at the Wellcome Collection. I think there is this terrible doom and gloom attached to any unusual experiences so by making my experiences public I wanted to give a sense of the difficulties of the journey but also the idea that there is hope. I personally have recovered - I don't want to say that everybody has to or needs to - but that's what my aim was, to give people a sense of hope. I was also a bit astonished by how much people I knew hadn't realised what was happening. Even close friends and family hadn't realised the intensity of it because I'm very good at carrying on and keeping up a front. So when it came to the exhibition I wanted to have a sort of story-line if you like; the highs, the lows, the horror, and most of all the humour. Bobby Baker, Day 386 © The Artist
ER Were you surprised at the sort of emotional responses it had from audiences? BB Yes, though funnily enough I vanished into hospital for a knee operation while the exhibition was on. It was quite a relief actually because people were so overwhelmed and emotional; I was a bit stunned for a while. What was so astonishing was that I had thought that people who had been through the experience themselves might relate to it but I didn't realise how much. And I hadn't realised that family members of people experiencing mental health problems (there were a lot of comments and feedback from young people whose parents had been ill) would relate to it and that was very, very moving. I also, still, find it rather shocking that people are so horrified; sometimes it can be quite irritating actually. That sounds a bit unfair but people always talk about how awful it is – and it is of course - but it can also be very funny and it's part of being human. I've met the best people in the world through it because when you go through experiences like that - you're real; you don't have this front. So I find that the hardest bit to deal with – that people always say: 'oh, it's so terrible' and I think, 'Well I know, but look, here I am!' ER Did the process of creating the art work help you view your own experiences differently? BB The actual process of making paintings is wonderful. I am a professional artist in the sense of doing performances and that's how I make a living but I very rarely have had the time to do painting, though I 39
trained as a painter and I love it. But I found the actual process of making the paintings very soothing. There's something about drawing and putting paint on paper that's very absorbing. But, it's been a gradual process – especially after the book came out – of getting some distance from it all, and acceptance as it's rather humiliating to go mad. It's painful to look back on it. Initially the drawings gave me a sense of objectivity because I found it quite hard to realise how ill I was to begin with but now I do feel more of a distance. And the fact that I've had this extraordinary opportunity really feels a privilege because they're something to add to the whole pool of knowledge about what that experience can be like. I feel much stronger as a result of the whole process, but it's taken time. ER In your performance art you literally put yourself centre stage but I wondered whether you felt more or less exposed with the paintings? BB Very exposed. It was a risky thing to do and I've always considered very carefully the personal aspects I reveal, especially in relation to family and friends. I did talk to my family; Dora (my daughter – who is now a Clinical Psychologist and who co-curated the exhibition with me) and I talked a lot about balancing risk with positive consequences. Part of being mentally ill or going through the mental health system is you can get very angry at the injustice of it all - the under-funding, chaos or bigotry and I was sort of bloody-minded actually. I thought - I can't just keep quiet about this forever. If I had felt like I was on my own, I perhaps wouldn't have had the courage to do it but as a family we were very much helped by hearing stories and seeing bits of publicity where people talked about their experiences. I remember MIND did a whole series of pamphlets in 2000 featuring people like Paul Merton and it really helped me not to feel so alone. I felt I wanted to be part of that. If my story helps contribute to the general pool of knowledge, then that's worthwhile. ER As you say you trained as an artist, but were you consciously thinking that you wanted to create 'art'? BB I think what was interesting was that I didn't care. Each one was made at that time, unselfconsciously. I realised after I'd seen them exhibited that I had drawn them using intuitive approaches to perspective. I was taught classic Renaissance perspective techniques at art school, but when I was making the selection for the book I realised that in the more horrific or intense experiences I'd drawn myself sometimes miles away – or high up in the sky – using lots of techniques to communicate a 40
Bobby Baker, Day 165, © The Artist
range of experiences. So I found myself asking: where am I in relation to what's going on? I had done selfportraits before and they were always like looking in a mirror. It surprised me. What was so great about putting together the show at the Wellcome Collection that's now touring is how well it is presented – the curating, context and framing. I feel very lucky to have had such an opportunity and have the input of a professional gallery team with experienced curators as well as colleagues and designers. ER It's interesting that you should say that because, as you know, the Outside In: National exhibition is in the main spaces of Pallant House Gallery and that sense of presenting the artwork as valuable is very central to the philosophy of Outside In. BB I'm really interested in this whole notion of the valuing of work and if it's good, and I know the Outside In work is excellent, it needs to be presented well. It's that nuance of how it is seen and subliminally, how people receive it. I think that's the value of the standards you have set at Pallant. Part of the ongoing debate about the whole movement of Outsider Art is historically quite fascinating, but work can be presented really badly. I think what Outside In has done over a period of time is to build this sense of value, not
Bobby Baker, Day 226, © The Artist
Bobby Baker, Day 113, © The Artist
just in the quality of the work and people being able to value it themselves but other people seeing how good the work is. It really does make a significant difference. ER Do you view yourself as an Outsider Artist? What does the term mean to you? BB Well, I want to look at this more in the future and perhaps produce a piece of work about it. I know I'm not an Outsider in those terms but who defines that? Because I think I'm an insider in some senses. I went to Art School and yet I have had the experience of mental illness. It's interesting – the question of who's in and who's out. Since I left Saint Martins I have very consciously tried to be on the edge – I would prefer, as an artist, to not quite fit any definition or category of art form. I want to make work that is between things and so making these drawings fits in my position really of not joining a club. ER Channel 4 have recently run a series called 'Channel 4 goes Mad' which was quite controversial and you have used the word 'Mad' in your own titles. What do you think of these linguistic choices? BB I see it as an on-going campaign, really, to create debate and dialogue. I think that as somebody who has been 'mad' I can use the word but the language around mental illness is extremely problematic. It's a subject
that produces fear, ignorance and prejudice, and it's very easy to scapegoat other people and be wary of them. But I think a series of programmes like that is valuable. They're always going to offend somebody but it adds to the whole pool of media knowledge. Ten years ago you wouldn't have had programmes like that. Some of it is bound to not quite work but I get very, very frustrated with the embarrassment. I'm on a kind of lifelong mission to deal with the prejudice and the stigma, because it's profoundly isolating when people tiptoe around the subject and the words. ER Finally, what can we expect from your event at the Gallery, 'On the Drawing of Breath'? BB It's about the process of making the Diary Drawings and how that relates to my journey through being ill and getting better. The breath aspect is mindfulness, which I adapted in my own way because I couldn't do it in a group. Drawing can be contemplative and breathing and thinking is an interesting aspect to it. But really it's an illustrated talk about how I got there and what happened on the way. Bobby Baker is a judge for Outside In: National. 'On the Drawing of Breath' is on Thursday 24 January, 6pm. See p.56 for details. Her book, Diary Drawings: Mental Illness and Me is published by Profile Books. 41
practical alchemy A new acquisition of 30 ceramics by artists from Janet Leach to Edmund de Waal marks 30 years of Pallant House Gallery. Simon Martin, Head of Collections and Exhibitions, considers its impact on the Collection.
"I once heard someone dismiss ceramics as 'fit for the kitchen'. If ceramics were good enough for use in the imperial court of China, if they interested Picasso enough for him to create them, and interested Lady Sainsbury enough for her to collect them, then they are good enough for me." Dr Mark Golder, 2012 Over the last three decades, Pallant House Gallery has developed a modest collection of British Studio pottery but it is perhaps symptomatic of the historic divide between fine art and craft that it has largely been given the role of supporting act. Whilst it is the paintings in Walter Hussey's founding bequest to the Gallery that garner most of the attention, the Dean also had an eye for understated sculptural ceramics such as a Hans Coper Spade Vase, an exquisite vase and bowl by Lucie Rie, and a striking Shell Vase by James Tower. It would, of course, be absurd to imagine Hussey tucking into his cereals from a Lucie Rie bowl (although I have known collectors who continue to use their Rie coffee cups despite their soaring value), yet the association of ceramics with usefulness is perhaps difficult to shrug off. Various pots by the pioneer British Studio potters, Bernard Leach and his followers at the St Ives Pottery: Michael Cardew, Norah Braden, Katherine Pleydell-Bouverie, William Marshall and John Leach, that are both functional and aesthetically appealing, have subsequently been presented by other donors, and where possible we have tried to display these side-by-side with the work of the St Ives painters and sculptors.
Together the Gallery's ceramics collection formed the starting point for an exhibition in the Treasury of Chichester Cathedral in 2005 entitled 'British Studio Pottery from Bernard Leach to Lucie Rie.' Featuring over 90 pots, by more than forty British potters, it was something of a learning curve for me in terms of understanding the history, techniques and complexity of Studio Pottery. As the majority of the exhibits were from private collections it also gave me a privileged insight into the passion that collectors have for their pots, an appreciation that comes from handling pots and sensuous enjoyment of their surfaces. Several of the pots in the Treasury exhibition were loaned by two inspirational collectors whom one might assume to be more interested in the graphic qualities of printmaking than in the tactile nature of ceramics, as during the last decade Mark Golder and Brian Thompson have supported the purchase of over 250 contemporary prints for the Gallery. But on a personal level they also have a nuanced approach to collecting ceramics, which is both pragmatic and spiritual, something Golder sees as more personal than their strategic print acquisitions for the Gallery. Dr Golder, a schoolteacher and former monk, describes ceramics as: 'works of practical alchemy - a true example of taking the four elements and bringing forth something higher and more beautiful that transcends the constituent parts.' As a collector he also comments that they are: 'more down to earth: they are affordable works of sculpture, pieces of 3D art which in many cases can be held easily in the hand,
Foreground Bruce Chivers, Japanese Handle, Porcelain, Pallant House Gallery (The Golder-Thompson Gift, 2012)
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Edmund de Waal, Large lidded storage Jar, Porcelain, Pallant House Gallery (The Golder-Thompson Gift, 2012)
Colin Pearson, White Stem Cup, Porcelain, Pallant House Gallery (The Golder-Thompson Gift, 2012)
turned and appreciated from many angles. It is possible to build up a collection of 20th century ceramics on a modest budget and to have a clear sense of direction when collecting.' Golder's interest in collecting ceramics began in his early twenties when he read about Sir Alan Barlow's collection of Oriental and Islamic ceramics in books in the Barlow family library. The Barlow family's giving of work through The Art Fund got him thinking about collecting and donating, and in his early thirties his interest in ceramics was encouraged by the critic Marina Vaizey when they met at a pool-side party in California. Golder recalls how: 'I was very tentative about how to set about entering a gallery and asking about ceramics. She encouraged me to go the Beaux Arts in Bath... and I am still going there 20 odd years later… Another important influence was Ron Sloman, a truly delightful and kind dealer who then had the St James' Gallery in Bath. With infinite patience and interest he introduced me to the early work of Edmund de Waal, Antonia Salmon and many others.' In the spirit of Hussey and Barlow, Golder and Thompson have now decided to donate a group of thirty pots from their collection to mark the thirtieth anniversary of the foundation of Pallant House Gallery in 2012. None of these potters have previously been
represented in the collection and so through one generous gift the Gallery will be able to illustrate the work of a range of makers. It encompasses historic examples such as a bowl by the early pioneer Studio Potter Charles Vyse (1882–1971) who was influenced by Chinese Sung pottery, and an asymmetric vase by the American Janet Leach (1918–1997), wife of Bernard Leach and the driving force behind the St Ives Pottery, through to contemporary potters such as Chun Liao, Carina Ciscato and Robin Welch. The pots have been selected to represent a range of different ceramic techniques and approaches, including porcelain by Takeshi Yasuda and Colin Pearson, stoneware with ash glazes by Richard Batterham, William Plumtre and Mike Dodd and textured jugs by Jane Wheeler and Aki Moriuchi. Over time Golder and Thompson plan to give further examples by these potters and others, and Golder hopes that: 'the gift might encourage other ceramic collectors to see that Pallant House Gallery takes this area of art seriously and then make donations of their own. All collections are partial - I like X, Brian likes Y, but neither of us like Z. But a group of dedicated collectors with individual tastes can cover a broad range.' Modern British Art: The Permanent Collections are on display all year round throughout the galleries.
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a legacy for all Kate Mosse, author, talks to Stefan van Raay, departing Director of Pallant House Gallery
Š Robert Taylor
September 2012 and we are sitting outside in the garden. Though it's sunny, there is a hint of autumn in the air; a sharpness, a certain slant of light through the canopy of the plane trees. The water reflects up on to the red bricks of the Queen Anne townhouse and bounces off the beautiful Gulbenkian award-winning modern extension that surrounds Christopher BradleyHole's tranquil courtyard garden. These are the summer dog days, the moment at which the new term begins. For Pallant House Gallery, it is a moment of change. Stefan van Raay, the charismatic and popular Director of the Gallery is moving on at the end of October. Originally from Holland, Stefan took up the job in September 1997, having been Senior Curator of Art at Glasgow Museums. I begin by asking Stefan why he came to Chichester.
Stefan van Raay First of all, I knew the area. I had friends and visited Pallant House Gallery several times. I was intrigued by the place, thought it a charming and enjoyable enterprise. So, when an opportunity came up, I was already aware of what might be done here. I saw the potential and decided to take a risk. Besides, the world of the arts was very political in Scotland at that moment. There was a great deal of nationalism involved in arts and local authority politics in Glasgow. That wasn't for me. Kate Mosse Was there a clear vision of what the Trustees wanted from the new Director? SVR Absolutely. They knew they wanted to expand and extend and were looking for a person to lead that. They weren't interested in the status quo, but rather in transformation. I saw this as a chance to project my personality, to lead and influence. More than that, I liked the ambition of the Trustees. I have a commitment to our own times in art and, to celebrate that, I made it clear I thought Pallant House Gallery should aim for a modern, contemporary extension. Something forward looking, not backward looking. I also very much wanted to work with David Hopkinson, then Chairman of the Trustees, and Angus Hewat, who are men of amazing generosity and support. No major project, such as we embarked upon, can be achieved without everyone being completely committed and working together. David is the sort of man who has a sense of social responsibility and purpose, wants to give something back to society. I 47
felt we would work well together. In addition, the Chairman of the Friends and Chairman of the Appeal was Mary Gordon Lennox. She, too, was inspiring and tireless and gave me unqualified support. Since the project would be one of vision, delivered through a high level of fundraising and local and national networking, the personalities involved were key to the project’s overall likelihood of success. KM Did you have a set of targets, either given to you or that you wrote for yourself? A time frame within which you wanted to achieve your vision? SVR I am not much of a planner in terms of long term career goals. I'm more the type to throw myself heart and soul into a project. Having said that, I had a wish list of what I wanted to do: first, to build the collection, second, to put Pallant House Gallery on the regional and national map, third, to put education and outreach at the heart of things, rather than treat them as an add-on. There was also the promise of works from Sandy Wilson and his wife the architect MJ Long. Wilson designed the new wing with Long & Kentish – which would include works by amongst many others, Richard Hamilton, Peter Blake, Patrick Caulfield, Lucian Freud and R.B. Kitaj. When I arrived in 1997, Pallant House Gallery was a 'historic house with a good modern art collection'. I wanted to turn that around and transform it into an internationally renowned art gallery that happened to be in a beautiful historic house. KM What were your first challenges? SVR I knew that most of my time in the first instance would be divided between fundraising and planning, a parallel exercise. We needed to raise the funds to build and extend and, of course, to go through all the necessary application and consultation processes to achieve it. I thought the fundraising would be difficult, but actually the planning was much more complicated and took longer than expected. It's not surprising - what we were attempting, after all, was to build a beautiful and contemporary extension to a Grade I listed building in a densely built-up conservation area in an English cathedral city. Not easy. We were not out of the newspaper for three years. KM How did that feel? SVR I stood up and campaigned for what I believed in. I just never gave up. KM Were you surprised at the level of opposition? SVR Yes, but I realise it was all very English. There hadn't been many examples of this sort of architectural work in Britain –you remember the rows over the extension to the National Gallery in 48
London? – and lots of people simply don't like change. But I feel that a city, such as Chichester, with such an extraordinary reputation for the arts across all fields – theatre, art, music, heritage – needs to develop organically. It cannot stand still. And I passionately believe that a building is only a means to engage with people and art. KM In July 2006, nine years after you arrived as director, the new extension opened. SVR Yes. It was an £8.6 million project - funded mainly by the Heritage Lottery Fund and many private donors and trusts. Because there had been a great deal of opposition – as well as a great deal of support from those who wanted Chichester on the map for modern art and architecture – it was a tribute to everyone who had worked so hard when the Gallery won the 2007 Gulbenkian Prize. The judges said the juxtaposition of the architecture created 'a vibrant relationship between old and new.' Also, everyday when I come to work, it still makes me proud that we have a proper Community and Learning programme and that it is at the heart of the Gallery. It's the first thing you see, not tucked away behind the bins at the back. The fact that we have the library, studio, resource centre in pride of place, underlines the principle that everything in Pallant House Gallery is for everyone. KM Did the space also give you the chance to show a wider range of work, to, as you put it 'take Chichester to the world'? SVR Yes. I wanted Pallant House Gallery to be a place where British art meets the world and we've achieved that. Now, we have 85% of the collection on show. We have added to the Walter Hussey Bequest – which was mainly modern British (figurative) art and the Charles Kearley bequest (more international work), with the added collection of Sandy Wilson and MJ Long. We gathered their work from all over the place, including the Fitzwilliam in Cambridge and National Gallery of Modern Art in Edinburgh and British Art Centre in Yale. It is now one of the most important modern British art collections outside of the Tate. Pallant House Gallery is now reviewed like a London gallery for all the shows – a massive change in reputation. KM It must have been exhausting. SVR It was but I couldn't have done it without my amazing and loyal staff, as well as the steadfast support of the Trustees. Now we have 28 full-time equivalent and some 250 volunteers – all of whom deserve credit for the part they've played in the Gallery's success.
© Peter Durant / arcblue.com
KM What makes you most proud? SVR That the Gallery is a place where people feel welcome, not intimidated. That it's a very open, holistic experience. Also, I am proud of our independence. We don't dance to anyone's agenda; we are very free and not over dependent on any one funding source. Over my 15 years here, we were forced to find private money because we didn't have much public funding at the start. In the end, this turned out to be a good thing because, when times got tough, we were less vulnerable than those art institutions relying on only one income stream. We've built up the endowment fund, friends membership has more than doubled. And Pallant is one of only 34 organisations nationally to get HLF DCMS Catalyst Funding in June 2012 – matched funding up to £2 million. KM What of the work itself? What exhibitions are you most proud of? SVR There are so many, for different reasons, but certainly Surreal Friends is one I will remember. I believe in balance. Even in 2012 most collections favour male artists so, for me, highlighting the work of three women, was a way of redressing that balance. KM In fact, many of your exhibitions here have celebrated women's creativity – but always in terms of art rather than politics. I'm thinking of Frida Kahlo and the new exhibition about to open.
SVR That's right. The exhibition opening in the autumn will celebrate the work of two of Britain's most distinctive and respected female artists, Gwen John and Celia Paul. For me, it's all about telling stories. How artists work together, inspire one another. And if I was staying, I would have loved to do Dorothea Tanning and Leonor Fini, who were in Edward James' collection. KM When you look back over your 15 years at the helm, are there any disappointments? Any decisions you wish you hadn't taken or missed opportunities? SVR I was very proud of the Robin and Lucienne Day exhibition, but I was sad that they died before they could see it. But, really, I live in the moment. I work so hard to bring people to the Gallery, to new works or artists, to reveal the connections between artists and audiences. I don't tend to think about what I should have done, but rather look forward.It's partly why I'm going now. I've achieved what I set out to achieve, I think I leave the Gallery in a good state of health. We are on the national and international map, our exhibitions are regularly reviewed by the national arts press. I wanted to go out on a high! KM What will you miss about Pallant House Gallery? SVR So much! The generous support, the genuine unique quality of Chichester which means people understand the social and transformative power of the arts; the open mindedness of visitors. Everything in the Gallery is a reflection of what I genuinely believe – which is equality for everyone, inclusion, ground breaking. I will miss the staff. They are the most incredibly loyal, exceptional group of people and we simply couldn't have achieved so much without everyone in the team working so hard together. I am more grateful to them than I can say. The sun has moved round and the dappled light drips through the canopy of leaves in the courtyard garden. There's no doubt that what Stefan has achieved in this corner of Sussex is a staggering achievement. An international Gallery, set in a local and national context, with education and access at the heart of a programme of excellence. The buildings work together, new and the old, contemporary artists and those who give us a window to the past. It is a tranquil place, a beautiful place where all are welcome. As for Chichester? The city will be the poorer without Stefan's energy, his vision and his infectious passion for the dialogue between artists and audience. We will miss him. 49
'A jewel in the british crown'
Š Peter Durant / arcblue.com
Colleagues from the art world reflect on Stefan van Raay's legacy Susie Allen, Curator Stefan van Raay is leaving an extraordinary legacy, not only to Chichester, but also to the nation by turning this wonderful museum into a jewel in the British crown. Through his vision, tenacity, drive and, in many cases, sheer stubbornness he raised the funds to build an awarding-winning contemporary gallery. He has won the admiration and respect of new collectors leading them to donate their collections to the Gallery helping make it what it is today, a great collection of Modern and Contemporary British art that is the envy of museums throughout the country. MJ Long, architect I have had a lifetime of clients and Stefan is my favourite, precisely because he was always clear about what he wanted, clear about his reasons for wanting it, and firm about protecting what he felt was most important in the building design. There are no good buildings without good clients, and Stefan was superlative. It is always a pleasure to go back to the building and to see the (sometimes surprising) way in which it is being used. This is entirely, I think, because the Gallery got what it wanted and is using it with pleasure and imagination.
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Joanna Moorhead, Journalist I met Stefan on a sunny day at Pallant House Gallery and within 15 minutes we had hatched a plan that would change both our lives. Did he, I asked, like the work of my cousin, the Surrealist Leonora Carrington? "Like her?" he said. "I love her. We're going to have an exhibition." Whether that was a statement or an invitation I've never been sure but within months we were partners on an extraordinary, and exotic, quest to track down Leonora's work and bring it home to Britain. It was a mammoth task, our exhibition. But, eventually, Leonora's paintings were hung on the walls in Chichester. I phoned to tell her that Stefan had delivered. I could tell she was moved. "Say thank you to him," she said. And I always have. Ben Langlands and Nikki Bell, artists Although it doesn't surprise us to hear that Stefan is following his heart and imagination to Mexico we are sad to hear he is leaving Pallant House Gallery and the UK because his singular vision, dynamism and ebullient intelligent charm will be missed by many people, especially by us. Stefan's invitation in 2002 to exhibit simultaneously at Pallant House and in Turner's studio at Petworth House was a decisive turning point for us. While installing these exhibitions Stefan was already deeply engaged in his ambitious project to build a major extension to the Gallery in Chichester. His extraordinary dedication towards achieving his aim so successfully has resulted in a magnificent gift to Chichester, and to Modern and Contemporary British Art.
Give to Pallant House Gallery and pay less tax Gifts given via your Will to Pallant House Gallery, like gifts to other charities, are free of inheritance tax. New rules now in force reduce the rate of inheritance tax on the rest of the estate where gifts to charity are more than 10% of the taxable estate. If you inherit from a friend or relative, you can vary your inheritance within two years. Suppose a relative has left 5% of their estate to charity. If, by a suitable variation, you make a gift to Pallant House that raises that 5% above the 10% threshold, the government pays for the whole of your gift. You actually inherit more after tax! 7R ÂżQG RXW PRUH DERXW VDYLQJ LQKHULWDQFH WD[ LQ \RXU :LOO YDU\LQJ DQ LQKHULWDQFH LQ D WD[ HIÂżFLHQW ZD\ RU DQ\ RWKHU DVSHFW RI \RXU personal affairs, please get in touch with us. Thomas Eggar is proud to support Pallant House Gallery
01243 786 111 @ThomasEggarLLP
Chairman of the Friends' Letter
© Peter Durant / arcblue.com
Dear Friends, Patrons and Gallery Club Members Following the launch of the 30 for 30 Appeal we are pleased to announce that we have raised £10,250, generously donated by around 100 Friends. As the summer is always a busy time and some Friends may have missed the notice we have decided to extend the appeal until Christmas. Another reason is that Pallant House Gallery has been awarded the Catalyst Endowment Funding award which means that every £1 we raise will be worth £2, providing a unique opportunity for our 4,000 Friends to help secure the future of the Gallery and celebrate the 30th Anniversary of our foundation. A small sum from a large number of people can result in a significant amount - just £5 from 4,000 Friends would bring in £40,000. If you wish to donate please send a cheque or cash to the Friends' Office or visit the Just Giving Website. We very much appreciate the terrific support our Friends give us and are extremely grateful to you all. Our main autumn and winter exhibition is the Outside In: National exhibition and we are extremely proud to be considered a centre of excellence in this important field. Through the generosity of those of you who have responded to our invitation to support this exhibition, we have now raised almost £900. The Art Lunch on Thursday 8 November will feature some of the Outside In artists. You can read more about this on page 53. 52
Pallant House Gallery Friends
Sarah Quail has been chairing the Friends' Events Working Group since 2008, producing some wonderful programmes. I am very grateful to her for giving so much of her time and energy to leading the Working Group. The programme continues under new stewardship and you can read about the events for the autumn and winter programme on page 53 and 54. We know that some of you would like to become more closely involved with the Gallery and so we have decided to make some changes to the Gallery Club and make it more accessible. By reducing the membership fee and introducing a programme of Gallery Club events we hope to achieve this aim. Jillie Moss, our Deputy Chairman, explains this in her article on page 55. In a few day's time we will say goodbye to Stefan van Raay, who has been Director since 1997. Stefan is leaving a very different Gallery to the one to which he came 15 years ago. We have a great deal to thank him for as, under Stefan's direction, the Gallery has become an institution of national and international stature. It is sometimes hard to recall the struggles and problems which Stefan faced on a daily basis during the two year period of closure whilst the new Gallery was being built. The extremely successful outcome is very much due to his diligence. We wish him all possible good luck for the future and thank him for his wonderful legacy. Stefan will be greatly missed. Lady Nicholas Gordon Lennox
what's on Friends' events
Friends' Private View Sun 28 October, 10-11am Enjoy unique access to the autumn season of exhibitions ahead of the public opening at 11am. which includes Outside In: National - an exhibition of prize-winning works by artists from the margins and Jean Dubuffet: Transitions - the first major review of the father of Art Brut in a public museum in the UK for nearly 50 years. Free. Coffee and biscuits provided. Peter Lely: A Lyrical View, Courtauld Gallery, London Thurs 1 November, 8.30am– 6pm (approx.) A day at the Courtauld Gallery to view not only its own art collection, which is one of great depth and quality, but also a rare exhibition of Peter Lely. Lely was England's leading painter from the period of the Civil War to the reign of Charles II and this exhibition which is organised around the Courtauld's own enigmatic work, 'The Concert', brings together an important group of paintings that have been loaned from historic and private collections. After lunch, which can be purchased at one of the restaurants or cafes within the grounds of Somerset House, we will view the Courtauld's Drawing and Prints Room which normally can only be visited by appointment. This is a chance to Tickets 01243 774557 (Booking Required)
see some of the most beautiful and seductive paintings made in 17thcentury England. £42 includes coach, driver's tip, admission to the Courtauld and guided tour. Lunch not included.
many others, was donated to 'be held in trust for Orkney' by the author, peace activist and philanthropist, Margaret Gardiner. £5 (£2.50 student Friends) includes coffee and biscuits.
The Art Lunch: Outside In Thurs 8 November, 10.30am-2.15pm The Art Lunch with a difference, we have invited five winning artists from the Outside In: National competition to talk about their work. After coffee in the Garden Gallery, Marc Steene, the Deputy Director and Head of Learning and Community, will give a short introduction to the project followed by the artists discussing their exciting and emotional artworks. There will be an informal lunch and a tour and discussion of the exhibition with the artists. £60 (Friends £54).
Friends' Tour: Jean Dubuffet Wed 21 November, 11am A guided tour of the Jean Dubuffet: Transitions exhibition with Katy Norris, Curatorial Assistant. £5 (£2.50 Student Friends) includes coffee and biscuits.
Talk: The Pier Art Centre, Orkney Tues 13 November, 11am Gallery Guides Anne Hewat and Jock Johnston will talk about visiting the Pier Art Centre in Orkney and the inspiring collection of British Fine Art housed there. This important collection of artworks including Barbara Hepworth, Patrick Heron, Ben Nicholson, Keith Vaughan among
The Art Lunch: Gwen John and Celia Paul: Painters in Parallel Thurs 24 January, 10.30am – 2.15pm Although Gwen John and Celia Paul were born in different centuries they share many similarities in their lives and art. To coincide with the exhibition of their work: Painters in Parallel, Gallery Guides, Beth Funnell and Jillie Moss, will give an illustrated talk on these two fascinating artists. They will explore issues such as their lives as models and muses to renowned artists, their intimate paintings, mainly portraits of other women, and the fact that both artists address issues of identity. After a private lunch from Field & Fork there will be a tour and discussion of the exhibition. £60 (Friends £54) Pallant House Gallery Friends
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Art Book Club: Seek My Face by John Updike Sun 21 October, 2.30–4pm The story of 79-year-old Hope Chafetz, a successful painter and the former wife of two legendary artists (lightly fictionalised versions of Jackson Pollock and Andy Warhol), framed by an intense daylong interview. £5 includes tea and cake
Art Book Club: Barbara Hepworth by A.M.Hammacher Sun 20 January, 2.30–4pm Professor Hammacher, who knew Barbara Hepworth well, traces her development as an artist and her determination to become a sculptor against parental wishes at a time when women sculptors were not taken seriously. £5 includes tea and cake
Art Book Club: Among the Bohemians by Virginia Nicholson Sun 18 November, 2.30–4pm In a vibrant catalogue of anecdotes, Virginia Nicholson pays homage to the 20th century artists who declared war on conformity and explores the consequences for themselves as well as for us. £5 includes tea and cake
Art Book Club: Life Studies by Susan Vreeland Sun 17 February, 2.30–4pm A deeply moving, richly textured collection of stories exploring art through the eyes of ordinary people caught up in the lives of famous artists from Monet's gardener to Manet's widow. £5 includes tea and cake
Pallant Proms Last Saturday of each month (excludes December), 12pm The popular piano recital series returns with Channarong Jantararat from the Royal College of Music, on Saturday 27 October, playing works from Prokofiev and Schuman. He will be followed by Samson Tsoy on Saturday 24 November. After a break in December the Proms will continue on Saturday 26 January and Saturday 23 February. Please contact the Friends' Office for full details of performers. £5 per performance. Friends Free but voluntary contributions towards expenses will be appreciated
patrons of the gallery We are immensely grateful to our Gallery Club members, the following Patrons of Pallant House Gallery, and to all those who wish to remain anonymous, for their generous support: Mr and Mrs John Addison Smith Keith Allison Lady Susan Anstruther John and Annoushka Ayton David and Elizabeth Benson Edward and Victoria Bonham Carter Vanessa Branson Patrick K F Donlea Frank and Lorna Dunphy Lewis Golden Paul and Kay Goswell Mr and Mrs Scott Greenhalgh Mr and Mrs Alan Hill
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Pallant House Gallery Friends
Kevin A S Jamieson James and Clare Kirkman Lefevre Fine Art Ltd Robin Muir and Paul Lyon-Maris Angie O'Rourke Catherine and Franck Petitgas Charles Rolls Mr and Mrs David Russell Sophie and David Shalit Tania Slowe and Paddy Walker John and Fiona Smythe Jane and Anthony Weldon Tim and Judith Wise John Young
Join our Club
Eduardo Paolozzi, Sun City, from Universal Electronic Vacuum, 1967, Screenprint on paper, Pallant House Gallery (Wilson Gift through The Art Fund, 2006) © The Trustees of the Eduardo Paolozzi Foundation
Jillie Moss, Deputy Chairman of the Friends introduces the new look Gallery Club Have you ever wished you could bring a visitor to the Gallery? Maybe a friend you enjoy looking at exhibitions with, a houseguest or relative? Well, now as a member of our new Gallery Club you can bring a guest every time you visit - and this is just one of the benefits. We all become Friends for different reasons; free entry and wishing to give financial support are probably the most universal. We hit the magic 4,000 earlier this year, which is a great achievement for a gallery this size. We value our Friends enormously and with the number steadily increasing it was the right time to look at the membership. It was obvious that we needed to re-think the Gallery Club, which had remained static in number for four years, and create some exciting changes. Meanwhile, our £30 Friends' benefits will not change and the cost has stayed the same for four years. This is terrific value for free entry, discounted prices for evening talks, the magazine and events and visits. One of the great attractions of becoming a Friend of the Gallery is the stimulating programme
of events which I have great fun both participating in and helping to create. Gallery Club members have always had access to this but now they will have some extra events as well. These will be similar to the Royal Academy visit in September for a private breakfast and tour of the stunning exhibition of the Clark collection of Impressionist works. We plan an evening visit to the RA again next year with an exhibition tour and private drinks in the Royal Academy Drawing School. We will have more private tours of galleries and also visits to artists' studios. Next February we are holding a reception for Gallery Club and Patrons with a tour of the Kitaj exhibition. We are hoping that this will appeal to some of our Friends, and we have already had quite a few interested enquiries, especially as we are actually reducing the membership cost from £300 to £100 for single and £150 for joint membership. If you would like to join the Gallery Club or for more information, please telephone Gillian Thompson in the Friends' office 01243 770816
Pallant House Gallery Friends
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what's on gallery talks What is Outside In? Thurs 1 November, 6pm An opportunity to meet the team and the artists involved in the pioneering project. Free (Booking essential: 01243 774557) Richard Cork: The Healing Power of Art Thurs 15 November, 6pm Distinguished Art critic Richard Cork discusses the astonishing richness of images found in medical settings ranging from dramatic confrontations with suffering to the most sublime celebrations of heavenly ecstasy, by the likes of El Greco, Van Gogh, and Naum Gabo. Talk and wine: £12 (Friends £10.50) Talk only: £8.50 (Friends £7, Students £7.50) Ben Wilson: From Wood Sculptor to Chewing Gum Artist Thurs 15 November, 6pm Best-known for creating tiny pieces of art on chewing gum stuck to the street, Ben Wilson also paints and sculpts and has exhibited internationally. He will talk about his life and creative processes. Studio. Free (Booking essential: 01243 774557)
Celia Paul and William Feaver in conversation Thurs 22 November Whilst studying at the Slade, Celia Paul was taught by Lucian Freud for whom she became a model, featuring in several paintings such as 'Naked Girl with Egg' (1981) and 'Painter and Model' (1986-87). To mark the exhibition Painters in Parallel, Celia Paul talks to Freud expert William Feaver about her life, work and relationship with the late great painter. Talk and wine: £12 (Friends £10.50) Talk only: £8.50 (Friends £7, Students £7.50) Roger Cardinal: The Marginal Arts Thurs 29 November, 6pm In 1972 Roger Cardinal first coined the term 'Outsider Art' as an English equivalent of Art Brut. In this talk he discusses the strange and seductive beauty of the marginal arts and puts the case for treating such forms of expression as potentially fascinating and admirable. Talk and wine: £12 (Friends £10.50) Talk only: £8.50 (Friends £7, Students £7.50)
Find the rest of the public programme including tours, screenings and workshops in the What's On guide or online at www.pallant.org.uk To book telephone 01243 774557 or visit our website.
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Tickets 01243 774557 (Booking Required)
Laurent Danchin on Dubuffet Thurs 6 December, 6pm Jean Dubuffet is best known as the father of Art Brut, coining the concept in 1945 and creating a celebrated Art Brut collection. Laurent Danchin, Editor of Raw Vision France, explores the complex, intricate and controversial universe of the renowned French artist. Talk and wine: £12 (Friends £10.50) Talk only: £8.50 (Friends £7, Students £7.50) Sue Roe on Gwen John Thurs 10 January, 6pm In 1942, at the height of his fame, Augustus John predicted that '50 years from now I shall be known as the brother of Gwen John'. Gwen John is indeed now recognised as a great artistic innovator. In this talk, her biographer Sue Roe uncovers the life of this ardent and complicated personality, one of the finest artists of her day. Talk and wine: £12 (Friends £10.50) Talk only: £8.50 (Friends £7, Students £7.50) Bobby Baker: On the Drawing of Breath Thurs 24 January, 6pm In this illustrated talk renowned performance artist Bobby Baker will explore how painting, breathing and madness led her to create the remarkable series of drawings, 'Bobby Baker's Diary Drawings: Mental Illness and Me 1997–2008' now published as a book, which won MIND Book of the Year 2011. Talk and wine: £12 (Friends £10.50) Talk only: £8.50 (Friends £7, Students £7.50)
Booking Form Please print and check all details carefully. Incomplete forms and incorrect details will delay the processing procedure. Event
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We endeavour to accommodate any special requirements. Please ring 01243 774557 to discuss your needs.
at pallant house gallery
'I love Field & Fork at Pallant House GallerySam Mahoney is a brilliant cook.' Elle MacPherson, Tatler
www.fieldandfork.co.uk
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CHICHESTER FESTIVAL THEATRE
PERFECT PRESENTS GIFT VOUCHERS FOR FESTIVAL 2013 CHICHESTER FESTIVAL THEATRE AT FIFTY A new book by Kate Mosse
CFT.ORG.UK 01243 781312
Otter Gallery Surveying Landscape: Brian Thompson & James A Wade Jr Sculpture and Drawings
7 December 2012 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 27 January 2013 British sculptor Brian Thompson and American sculptor James A Wade Jr - who met at the Ironbridge Open Air Museum of Steel Sculpture in Shropshire - both have an interest in scale as the key to unlocking our experience of landscape. Their work is brought together for the first time in an exhibition that underscores the strong affinity between the sculptures they produce. Otter Gallery University of Chichester College Lane Chichester PO19 6PE
Free Admission 01243 816098 www.chi.ac.uk/ottergallery infoart@chi.ac.uk
Top: James A Wade Jr, Killhope Burn Below: Brian Thompson, River Wear
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Opening of Peter Blake and Pop Music, and The Royal Visit Spotted yourself on our photo pages? Photographs from all our previews are available to view and buy online at www.photoboxgallery.com/pallant. The password is 'pallant'. All photographs by Jason Hedges
(Left to Right) Chrissie and Sir Peter Blake, Derek Boshier, Paul Gorman, Keith Clark, Sue Timney and Justin de Villeneuve
(Left to Right) Kim and Jane Slowe, Sean Cullen, Harry Wilson and band members, Ron and Willow King
(Left to Right) Countess of Wessex, Jasmine Weekes, Emily Steene, Flora Steene, Earl of Wessex, Molly Steene, Countess of Wessex and Earl of Wessex
If you would like to hire the Gallery for a party, private dining event or a canapĂŠ reception please contact Helen Martin on 01243 770838
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Collection in Focus Patrick Caulfield, Reserved Table, 2000
Patrick Caulfield, Reserved Table, 2000, Acrylic on canvas Pallant House Gallery (Wilson Gift through The Art Fund), © Janet Nathan Caulfield
James Thompson is a participant in the Outside In: Step Up programme, an innovative project which provides professional development and research opportunities. Here, he explores one of the Gallery's key works. Having joined the Royal College of Art in 1960, the year after David Hockney and a number of pioneers of British Pop Art, Patrick Caulfield's work has often been associated with the movement. At Pallant House Gallery, Caulfield's paintings are shown in good Pop Art company, yet it is a classification he never accepted. Caulfield had an eye turned back to the imagery and formalism of the Cubists and the early twentieth century French avant-garde. There are often humorous references to the art of an earlier generation in his paintings which, at the same time, always look fresh and modern and in a style quite unlike any of his contemporaries. What interested me about Reserved Table when I was looking for a subject for my research on the Step Up programme was its mysterious atmosphere. The strange feeling generated by the painting is heightened by the presence of the lobster, an object associated with Surrealist art, particularly in the work of Salvador Dali and his Lobster Telephone. The painting also displays a formal concern with contrasting elements; a dark alcove on the right is balanced with a similar shaped doorway on the left through which light streams from the main restaurant or kitchen beyond. The immaculate white of the 64
tablecloth contrasts with the perfect blackness behind the lobster in an oval mirror. Unlike in that most famous of paintings with a mirror, Velásquez' Las Meninas, this one reflects not the royal family or the artist but beyond a seafood meal, a void. The viewer is confronted with a puzzle; who is this table reserved for and what is their story? Caulfield was a fan of film noir cinema and the crime fiction of writers such as Raymond Chandler, and in Reserved Table there is a sense of far more going on than just an observed every-day scene. Sitting in front of the painting I can imagine the sound of this place, a hushed, darkened corner where noise is dampened by plush furnishings, punctured by the stark light and clamour of a noisy kitchen. The size of the work, the empty mirror and the absence of the human form within the composition seems to suggest the table is reserved for us, the viewer, if only we could walk into the painting and complete the narrative. Then again, with the lobster sitting on what could be a small telephone shelf, the table may be awaiting the return of Dali to receive the cooked telephone he wondered why he was never served, in place of a lobster in his book, The Secret Life of Salvador Dali. An audio trail based on a dedicated piece of research into the collections has been produced by the Step Up participants and will be available during the Outside In: National exhibition. An exhibition exploring the project will be in the Studio (23 October – 2 December 2012)
COMPETITION WINNERS
IN THE 16TH NATIONAL OPEN ART EXHIBITION WORKS FROM ARTISTS ACROSS THE ENTIRE UK CHOSEN BY A PANEL OF 5 JUDGES ARE EXHIBITED IN CHICHESTER & LONDON
EXHIBITED AT
PALLANT HOUSE GALLERY
THE MINERVA THEATRE GALLERY CHICHESTER, WEST SUSSEX
11 - 21 OCTOBER FREE ADMISSION
THE PRINCE’S FOUNDATION GALLERY HOXTON, LONDON
24 OCTOBER - 1 NOVEMBER FREE ADMISSION
“For some this exhibition is the moment an artist’s career really takes off” Catherine Lampert “Now the best Open Art Competition in the UK” Gavin Turk
www.thenationalopenartcompetition.co.uk
Sponsored by Towry, the Wealth Adviser www.towry.com ADMINISTERED BY THE CHICHESTER ART TRUST CHARITY NO 1067096
PALLANT HOUSE GALLERY CHICHESTER, WEST SUSSEX
6 - 18 NOVEMBER
WATERCOLOUR + WORKS ON PAPER FAIR SCIENCE MUSEUM, LONDON
31 JANUARY - 3 FEBRUARY 2013
Modern British and Irish Art London, South Kensington s 14 December 2012 Viewing
Contact
8 –13 December 85 Old Brompton Road London SW7 3LD
Angus Granlund agranlund@christies.com +44 (0) 20 7752 3240
christies.com
ALAN LOWNDES (1921–1979) Unloading the catch signed and dated ‘Alan Lowndes 1964’ (lower left) oil on board 20 x 24 in. (50.8 x 61 cm.) £15,000–20,000 © ESTATE OF ALAN LOWNDES. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, DACS 2012