The Hotspur - Issue 16 - Jamie Warde

Toulouse-Lautrec was almost as passionate about
cuisine as he was about art, absinthe and
prostitutes. He is credited with inventing
the tremblement de terre cocktail – a mixture of
absinthe and cognac which, if taken frequently,
may, alongside his syphilis, explain why the
painter didn’t see 40.
After his death, his childhood friend and dealer,
Maurice Joyant, collected together his recipes,
and those of many of his friends and relations,
and published them as “La Cuisine de Monsieur
Momo, célibataire”.
Some of the recipes verge on the surreal – one
for Grilled Saint suggests you get the Vatican to
supply you with a modern Saint Lawrence, while
the artificial rabbit pâté is made largely of veal.
There is a certain amount of casual cruelty –
Antoine Mizon, an explorer of the
Congo, describes an infallible method of
ensuring chicken is tender: you chase it across
open countryside for a bit, before shooting it (he
recommends what sounds like number 8 shot –
“abbatez-le a coups de fusil chargé de très petits
plombs”). The artist’s mother’s recipe for confit
d’oie calls for four geese “so fat they can barely
move” while for her galantine she specifies one
“grasse à en mourir”. I know you need very fresh
trout for truites au bleu, but the version here
suggests they should still be alive when they hit
the boiling vinegar.
However, most of the recipes are relatively
simple to do, even if finding all the ingredients
may prove time-consuming – for a cassoulet to
dream of, you will need bones, calves’ feet and
hocks, a goose neck stuffed with sausage meat,
smoked ham, some mutton, a truffled pig’s foot,
goose giblets and the meat and carcase of a
goose as well as white beans from Soissons,
tomatoes, onions, garlic and shallots.
His mother’s boeuf à la Malromé is a tasty and
tender beef stew, cooked for up to six hours and
made with Malromé wine, which she describes as
a “très bon Bordeaux rouge” without declaring
an interest in the fact that she owned the château
– a place her son loved and where he died
(although not, despite what Wikipedia would
have us believe, where he was born – he was
already 18 when she bought it). Sadly Malromé
is almost unobtainable in the UK,
although thospeatling.co.uk in Suffolk apparently
stocks the 2006 vintage.
One of his favourite recipes was for pigeons
with olives, which he would cook himself for very
special friends. For each person take one wood
pigeon (preferably in the autumn when they
taste better), stuff with minced meat (probably
beef), sausage meat, nutmeg, pepper and
chopped truffles. Fry the birds quickly in a
casserole, remove and then fry some shallots and
chopped onions in a mixture of butter and lard;
once the onions are coloured, thicken with flour
and then add stock and a bouquet garni. Put the
pigeons in the liquid (which, by the end,
“doit être onctueuse”), cover and simmer very
gently for “une petite heure”. 20 minutes before
the end, add half a pound of the best green
olives you can find (pitted) and a glass
of Armagnac.
DICKY UMFRAVILLE IS AWAY
Thanks to Matthew Rice for the Badger.
In the Kitchen.
With our guest
cookery editor,
Alan Sykes.
The Hotspur
Overlooked Artists
The Hotspur
Jesse Rae, Overlooked Artist.
later in the year. You should give him a listen, it’s
The cover illustration to this edition of The Hotspur
superb stuff. 500 signed copies of The Best O’ are
is by Ant Macari. It’s a fan portrait of an
available directly from Jesse’s website
unjustifiably overlooked artist, the Scottish white
jesserae.co.uk and his album The Thistle can be
soul/funk singer and aspiring independent
downloaded from iTunes. His awesome videos
politician, Jesse Rae.
are available on DVD from the record label,
Rae, who lives in St Boswell’s, reached number 65
savage-hospitality.com.
in the British pop singles chart with 1985’s Over
‘Far better to be overlooked
than condemned’
Dicky Umfraville, November 1961.
For a while, I imagined that the glamorous
individual above, Marino Marini, was the creator
The Sea. The album that followed, The Thistle,
Overlooked politician
failed to make a position, despite great songs and
In 2007, Jesse stood for the Scottish Parliament as
a sterling production job by the late Roger
an independent in the Scottish Borders electoral
artist celebrated on a post card like a pop singer?
Troutman (of Zapp fame).
constituency of Roxburgh and Berwickshire He
Even our Damien hasn’t managed that, yet.
An ASCAP award-winning music video pioneer
gained 318 votes for a 1.2% share of the vote.
and talented songwriter who’s worked with a host
Standing again in 2011 as an independent
Italian Adam Faith no less, minus the third-rate
of international music names, he’s best known for
candidate in the expanded seat of Ettrick,
rock ‘n’ roll affectations; born with both voice of
Inside Out, Odyssey’s 1980 hit single. More
Roxburgh and Berwickshire he polled 308 votes
recently, in October 2010, Jesse opened for Adam
for a 1.1% share. The flamboyant Borderer has
Ant at London’s Union Chapel. Earlier in the
vowed not to take off his trademark plaid,
year, The Thistle album saw a digital reissue on
claymore and helmet until Scotland gains full
Savage Hospitality Records. In May 2011, he was
independence. Jesse has announced that he will
one of Adam Ant’s support acts at the O2
be standing as a MSP candidate again in 2015. He
Academy in Glasgow, playing two “live music
is proposing a new Scottish broadcasting
video shows” at Edinburgh’s Voodoo Lounge bar.
authority featuring frequencies for education, and
2012 saw the release of The Best O’, with a
changes to the Bankruptcy (Scotland) Act 1985.
scheduled companion release, Funk Warrior, due
Vote for Jessie!
of that rather priapic equestrian figure which
manned the Tate’s front door during the 1970s. An
Well, reader dear, I was to be disappointed. The
Marino Marini pictured is indeed a pop star: an
gold and dripping latin quiff.
I have a soft spot for his type of music. Italian
crooner-pop of the 50s and early 60s is glorious,
greasy melodrama, designed to move lips into
dazzling smiles, exultant pouts and wretched,
extravagant vows.
Though they do share a passing resemblance,
Marino Marini and Marino Marini, sadly, are not
the same man. What a hero he would have been!
Imagine it, drawing and slaving away with an
oxy-acetylene torch from 9 to 5, hammering out
gems like ‘Prima’ and ‘Tango Kriminale’ in the
clubs by night. That’s polymathy worthy of the
coolest of the cool, like Sir Kenelm Digby
(Oh go on, google him).
Now, save for a few connoisseurs and relatives
hoping for their respective revivals, neither
Marino is much remembered by anyone in this
careless world. A handful of dusty 45s for one,
humbler plinths for the other.
Never mind, what lives they must have led.
Salute them tonight with Motorhead and
burning sambuca!
A thousand thanks to every glorious, clever
contributor to this issue, to the thus-far
uncredited: Erica Van Horn for the loan of her
fabulous post card collection, Christian Barnes for
his photograph of Li Yuan Chia’s gravestone, Joel
Fisher for numerous inspirations, Simon Cutts for
his found Stephen Duncalf tribute and Antonio
Bachini and Gavin Uren, without whom there
would be no Hotspur.
The next issue’s theme is BADDIES. All
suggestions welcome. In the mean time, hang on
to your hats and get ready for a begging letter, we
haven’t sent one out for over two years.
Ciao!
THIS ISSUE OF THE HOTSPUR IS EDITED BY JAMIE WARDE-ALDAM, DESIGNED BY ANTONIO BACHINI
AND JAMIE WARDE-ALDAM, PRINTED BY A MIRACLE AND SUPPORTED BY THE
GENEROSITY OF THE HOTSPUR’S PATRONS.
Email: [email protected] Tel:07789737252.
significant, member of The Pre-Raphaelite
neglected. There are artists of little worth who
Brotherhood. True, there were no known extant
are famous. And when you study the most
works, but this was because his cavalier attitude
famous of neglected artists, you realize that
to thinners had both contributed to an early
historical reputation depends on notions of
admission to The Royal Surrey Lunatic Asylum
celebrity as fragile as the ones that sustain, say,
in Mortlake and to the rapid ruinous
a game show host. Put it this way : neglect and
degradation of his only known masterpiece, The
celebrity are rarely true reflections of artistic
Allegory of True Love in Brunel’s Tunnel. Still,
value. Ask the shades of El Greco who, now on
Lachrymose’s tragic career arc could be traced
brightly-lit Parnassus, once inhabited an
in the Asylum’s medical records where his
obscurity as dense as the clag in Lachrymose’s
incoherent ramblings were studied by local
South London urinal.
alienists and visiting professors from as far
magnificent case study in the swoops and
pub in Putney had sgraffito work, mostly of an
diversions of reputational fortune. Domenikos
energetically erotic nature, in the lavatories
Theotokopoulos was born in Crete, but took
which some experts attributed to the youthful
himself to Venice to be Titian’s bag-carrier.
artist (who taught at Mrs Venery’s Academy
On moving to the court of the Spanish king he
For Indigent Virgins in nearby Fulham).
was re-branded “El Greco” (The Greek).
The fictitious Lachrymose remains my
EAT YOUR HEART OUT, NAT TATE.
For any student of celebrity, El Greco is a
away as Luzern and Karlsruhe. Moreover, a
Now he became famous, big time. But then he
favourite neglected artist, although twenty-five
started painting odd, distorted figures and
years later he acquired a rival. This was Nat
became a recluse. For more than two centuries
Tate, an “American Artist” invented by the
after his death he was unknown. Look at a
novelist Will Boyd and posthumously
neo-classical dictionary of art and there is no
discovered in book form with a lot of flim-flam
reference to any of his various personas.
“Well-known for being under-rated” was
very seriously indeed. In those days, I looked
in New York, 1998. Never mind that his name
But then romantic travellers in the nineteenth
Michael Holroyd’s acid judgement of the
like a Led Zeppelin tribute (big hair and aviator
was a conflation of London’s National and Tate
century discovered in his haunting distortions
novelist William Gerhardie. Even more than
shades) and he looked like an ambitious
Galleries (f we had been in Washington DC he
the exact expression of the anguished state they
literature, art history provides stimulating scope
Gauleiter from Wurtemburg-Hohenzollern
might have been Hirsschorn Smithson, Jnr.) a
were struggling to describe. The art historian
for bitching about reputations big, small and
circa 1930 (buzz cut and rimless specs).
surprising number of people were gulled by
who legitimized van Gogh, Julius Meier-Graefe,
non-existent. Unless the warm glow of genius
Looking back, I feel sorry for Dr Finke
Boyd’s epic jape.
was the same art historian who legitimized The
is inflamed by the busy little demons of
(wonderfully, his real name).
ambition, reputations may never be built. And,
One day, to avenge ourselves for his
His monograph included bad photographs of
rubbish pictures Boyd had painted himself. Not
Greek. Soon Picasso, no less, was saying “Soy
El Greco”.
if built, will soon disintegrate unless fastidiously
scrupulous pedantry and an exacting insistence
everyone in a position to do so asked the
maintained.
on clarity in our apparatus criticus, a day when
penetrating question quite soon enough. The
then – nor is fame. The fact is: art has no
Neglect is not a permanent condition, but –
we had beer to drink and girls to divert, several
thing about art is, the distorting mechanisms of
permanent values. Taste is fickle. As
university. Good because I was impassioned by
of us, annoyed by the baffling conventions of
celebrity blind us to the matter of quality. The
Heraclitus knew, the only constant is change. I
the subject, bad because I refused to read
academic art history, decided to invent an artist
statement “All famous artists are great” is not at
will let Roland Lachrymose have the last word :
reading lists or study what I was told. And I
to expose the fatuity of Dr Finke’s rigid
all the same thing as saying all great artists are
“I fell in love with the goddess of Fame, but had
argued that a Ford Cortina was at least as
orthodoxy. In this way, Roland Lachrymose was
famous. Academic art history does not have
a knee-trembler with the whore of celebrity”.
aesthetically interesting as Claude Lorraine.
born one wet afternoon in nineteen seventies
the analytical tools to mine the conceptual fault-
I have no idea why such a perceptive and
Thus I had several collisions with an austere
Manchester.
line in between.
talented artist is so neglected.
I was a good and bad student of art history at
German tutor who took himself and his subject
Lachrymose, we insisted, was a minor, but
There are artists of real stature who have been
Tracksuit off
Morandi!
Overlooked? My candidate is Giorgio Morandi
straightforward, traditional still lifes. They are
(1890- 1964). ‘What?’ you snort. ‘The man who
ambiguous, well nigh abstract paintings. And
painted bottles all the time? But that’s absurd. A
architectural too – redolent surely of townscapes.
swathe of contemporary art-fearing Middle
Indeed, it might seem fanciful but I couldn’t help
England love him. They can’t get enough of his
thinking of Morandi when I encountered the
faded-plaster-wall, memories-of-easyJet-
puzzling, beguiling surfaces of Hilary Lloyd’s
holiday-in-Tuscany “good taste”. And there are
similarly near abstract film and video
umpteen Italian writers ready to proclaim him
installations (still lifes?) in the latest Turner Prize
the equal of Judd, Cézanne or Zurbarán. In any
exhibition.
case, didn’t Morandi want to be overlooked?
And then there’s the paint handling -
Think of him living alone in that dingy apartment
something which unfortunately doesn’t come
in Bologna. More to the point, think of the work -
across in reproduction. Compare Morandi with
its restraint, its reticence, its air of nerdy
famed painters’ painters of our times such as
obsession.’
Robert Ryman, Raoul de Keyser or Luc
Yes, yes, but he’s never included in the
Tuymans. Do any of them actually have a greater
standard story of twentieth century art. He gets
feeling for paint - for the exact weight, size,
mentioned, but always only in passing, always as
texture and opacity that each sweep, slap,
a footnote. To which of course you retort, ‘No
spatter, smudge and wriggle should have? I’m
wonder. Put him alongside the likes of Picasso,
not sure they do.
Duchamp, Pollock or even de Chirico, and his
So, I’m saying time to take notice of Morandi.
little paintings of mundane, domestic objects on
Why? Because at his best (which admittedly is
a table (well, a barren plane) pushed up against
only in a handful of works from the 1950s and
a wall just don’t measure up.’
60s) he is one of the most quietly compelling of
Well, all right he’s not in the Picasso-Duchamp-
artists. ‘Quietly compelling’? Aaaaargh! I know, I
Pollock league but he’s not bad, is he? Look at
know. That’s numbing exhibition-catalogue-
how he arranges objects - stacks them up,
speak. I’ll say it in football-round-up –speak.
places one in front of the other, squeezes them
Morandi deserves to be looked at again because
together in a little clump in the centre of the
at his best he’s too good to be left on the bench.
picture. Look at how he treats light –sometimes
He is potential first team material. He needs to
there are shadows, sometimes there aren’t. And
get his tracksuit off. He needs to be out there on
look at the wonderful, infinitely subtle
the pitch from the kick-off - -out there reminding
modulations of colour and tone. These are not
us all what a star he is...erm, was.
FRA FILIPA LIPPY
LORENZO BLOTTO
A good place for finding works by painters and
20th century carry-on from old Punch jokes to
illustrators gone but not wholly forgotten is
wallpapery abstractions. The heart lies in
Abbot & Holder in Museum Street, just round
topography, so much so that the Lake District in
the corner from the British Museum, an
sunshine and shower is on constant view.
institution as scholar-friendly as the BM’s Prints
Sadly the monthly lists of works in stock, always
& Drawings Department and more hands on, for
an entertaining read, have been replaced with an
one can riffle at will through stacks and folders
online version. Fully illustrated, which helps, but
without having to wear cotton gloves. As for the
there was an enduring appeal to the familiar
scholarship, so confident are they of their
screeds of grey print, time after time, fresh from
expertise, A&H offer money back and a box of
the Gestetner.
Black Magic to any purchaser misled by any of
their attributions. They publish too. Their lists are
Much of what’s on offer comes presumably from
roll calls of the defunct and the bin-ended, the
bulk buys at studio sales, for most artists leave
deservedly overlooked mixed in with the sadly
heaps of drawings, and this is where A&H move
and surprisingly so.
in and perform their invaluable funerary and
restorative service. Here in their agreeable last
They used to be in Barnes, in a big house with a
chance saloon reputations get a nod and a wink
short front drive and on some Saturday
and the possibility of renewed appreciation
afternoons the possibility of a tot of sherry and
arises.
mince pie in the drawing room. Back then you
A MASTERPIECE OF PERIOD ANXIETY
By William Feaver.
could get for a fiver a Bewick tail-piece or a John
Some examples: Late on in the Barnes period I
Leech thumbnail sketch featuring pompous early
came upon a small drawing of a stroppy looking
Victorian gents or, even better, a classic
woman’s naked upper half pieced together by a
collapse-of–stout-party cartoon by Charles
pupil after William Roberts, having drawn it, had
Keene, one of Degas’ favourite artists. Today the
torn it up. He must have been demonstrating
prices are mostly in the low hundreds and run
purity of line. Roberts keeps on getting
into modest thousands but the three floors of the
overlooked. He was one of the founding fathers
Museum Street shop are as crammed as the
of Modern British, as the salerooms label it; a
Barnes house ever was and still the elevated
sort of Stanley Spencer without the garrulity.
bran tub ambience prevails.
Then, not long after the move to Museum Street,
The ascent from street level takes the potential
I took a fancy to a sea picture laughably ascribed
collector on a steady climb through the
at one time to John Martin. (Not that A&H
Picturesque, featuring 18th century excursion
claimed it to be by him: their trusty box of Black
studies from ladies’ albums, to the heights of mid
Magic moulders still, presumably, in the office
safe.) But it was a dashing shipwreck , well worth
Even more unfair, I say. This was ‘Algy’ Newton
saving. Done, I imagine, around the time
(as he was known in art circles around Dedham)
Steerforth met his end off Yarmouth beach.
on top form, overstepping his usual line in
Canaletto-indebted townscapes and
My happiest A&H find, the one that ticks the
thunderclouded treescapes by introducing grim
most boxes, is a painting in a plain dark stepped
intimations. This at a time when calls for sanity
wooden frame. It’s most peculiar, a dramatically
could go either way, Munich-wards or Biggles-
overcast landscape in grey-green and RAF blue
wards. Newton, a veteran of the trenches, did
with featuring a withered tree pointing skywards
neither. Intentionally or otherwise his painting
where four ghostly riders look down at
collates a phenomenal number of period
catastrophe below: fires raging behind a distant
anxieties, mostly well founded. It’s more
hill, a plane diving in flames and, under the tree
Magritte than Canaletto, more Technicolor
a downed prototype Spitfire with an airman
nightmare from Alexander Korda’s Denham
draped across one wing, dead but not disfigured.
studios than ‘All Quiet on the Western Front’, and
it covers a spectrum of associations, from Rex
This I recognized as a missing masterpiece,
Warner’s Airmen and Auden’s Strangers to
‘Sentinels of Peace’, a painting described by
Powell & Pressburger’s Pearly Gates sequences,
Nicholas Usherwood in the catalogue for his
with David Niven starring, in ‘A Matter of Life or
1980 ‘Algernon Newton RA (1880-1968)’
Death’. The trees are Hitchcockian, the distant
retrospective as ‘curious and symbolic... present
buildings ablaze could well be Manderley. What
whereabouts unknown’. Reviewing the exhibition
a picture.
in The Observer I had described this ‘intriguing
gap in the oeuvre’, sight unseen, as ‘a wartime
For Algy Newton, he of the silver-topped cane,
excursion into Jehovah’s Witnessish cloudburst
disappointments came apace. ‘Sentinels of
symbolism.’
Peace’ was within months outdated. The artist’s
name faded or, rather, it passed to his son Robert
Unfair, and how was I to know?
‘Bobbie’ Newton, the spectacular painter drunk
Elle Greco
in ‘Odd Man Out’, the Long John Silver whose
When first shown, at the Royal Academy
‘AAAgh Jim Lad’ was the only memorable
Summer Exhibition of 1939 the Glasgow Herald
utterance in the Disney ‘Treasure Island’.
was mildly scathing about the Newtonian scale
of portent: ‘This attempt to run an emotional
Many of the best Overlooked Artists are the ones
electric current through his Canaletto-like
we can’t even put a name to.
machinery strikes one as a piece of none too
sincere sentiment.’
Digby Warde-Aldam lunches at Hitler’s Eagles’ Nest
Another
Blank
on the
Wall
“To forgive is wisdom, to forget is genius”
Recently, to break the wearisome drive south, we
made a detour via Wakefield to visit the new
Hepworth gallery. Perched picturesquely by a
weir on the river Calder the building blends in
well with its low grade industrial surroundings.
So well, in fact, that with its purple concrete finish
and razor sharp edges it looks like an upmarket
warehouse - which, in a sense, is exactly what it
is. A showcase principally for the work of its
namesake (and local lass) Dame Barbara, the
Hepworth also has a decent clutch of works by
some other well (and not so well) known mid20th century British artists. As I wandered
through it I began to entertain the faint hope of
being rewarded with the sight of a painting by the
‘forgotten genius’ Gerald Wilde. But alas, no.
Once more Gerald had not so much left the
building as simply not been invited in the first
place.
Obsession is too strong a word for it, but I have
long been fascinated by this overlooked maverick
of British painting, championed by some big
names like John Berger, David Sylvester and
William Feaver, yet consistently ignored by the art
establishment. I put my fascination down to two
things. One is archetypal - the shameful yet
irresistible allure of the gifted but wayward artist
undermined by his self-destructive tendencies.
The other is personal – an enduring memory from
a brief encounter with him many years ago.
My encounter happened so. After leaving
university I had no settled plan other than to stave
off having to make a serious decision about my
future for as long as possible. For a while I
returned home, but soon got itchy feet. So, after
answering an ad in Time Out for a garden helper,
I headed off to Gloucestershire to work for an
organisation called Beshara which occupied a
dilapidated Elizabethan mansion called
Sherborne House.
I turned up with little idea of what to expect. I
knew next to nothing about the Beshara people
(bliss was it in that pre-Google dawn to be alive
and uninformed!) except that they were Sufis who
lived a quasi-monastic life that was organised
around physical work, study, meditation, and zikr
(a form of devotional prayer that involves chanting
and rhythmic movement). I spent my time hoeing
rows of carrots, digging potatoes, and carting
muck around. Off duty I hung out with the other
inhabitants and joined in with whatever else was
going on. Most evenings were spent in
discussion around the kitchen table, and visitors
would often drop by. One such was (Sir) Peter
Brown, the father Arthur Brown (yes, the God of
Hellfire himself!), who entranced me with stories
of how he used his psychic powers to locate
sunken navy ships. Sir Peter clearly appreciated
my listening skills as he offered to tell me much
more if I cared to join him later, alone, in his room.
Politely, I declined.
Into the kitchen one evening stumbled a raving,
wall-eyed madman in an ill fitting black suit that
flapped around him like the rags on a deranged
dervish. I was startled, though no-one else
seemed bothered. It turned out this was one of the
occasional noisy visits from the eccentric artist
Gerald Wilde who lived and worked in “The
Stables”, a rather grand name for what was really
a potting shed in the vegetable garden. By day he
was largely invisible, only occasionally poking his
head out of the door like a timorous and rather
pallid gnome. But by night, if he had managed to
get his hands on some drink, he would stagger up
to the big house, rant inarticulately, and sooner or
later fall over. By other accounts of his life, real
and fictional, this was entirely in character, though
of course not at all the whole truth of him.
Gerald had arrived at Sherborne in 1971 under
the wing of John (J.G.) Bennett, who came to set
up a spiritual academy to promote the esoteric
teachings of G.I. Gurdjieff. After Bennett died in
1974 Gerald lived out his remaining years there
until his own death in 1986. His life at Sherborne
was settled (though impoverished) but it had not
always been so. He had led a turbulent,
bohemian existence in the 1940s in the pubs of
Soho in the company of a hard-drinking crowd of
artists and writers including the likes of Francis
Bacon, Tambimuttu (the editor of Poetry London),
and Julian McLaren-Ross (model for the dissolute
novelist X. Trapnel in Dance to the Music of
Time).
It was said of McLaren-Ross that he was ‘a
mediocre caretaker of his own talent’ and the
same might also be said of Gerald. A
combination of instability, bad luck, and bad
management all contributed to his inability to get
on in any conventional sense. A lot of his work
was destroyed during the Blitz. He sold paintings
for a few drinks or simply gave them away in
order, he claimed, to feel liberated. There was a
spell in a mental hospital followed by a long
period when he didn’t paint much, or at all.
Unlike his better known contemporaries (Bacon,
Piper, Sutherland) it seems he lacked any artistic
ambition other than to follow his own erratic and
unlucky star. Add to that his isolation and a
persecution complex (he believed Bacon had
ripped off his colours in the early days), Gerald
was never going to make it big on the art scene.
‘I am not very good at collecting together
thoughts, just dreams’ he once said. This well
encapsulates the difficulty of trying to describe
his work to someone who has never seen it. His
earlier paintings are sombre and
representational. I rather like a gloomy interior
called ‘The Brown Bedroom’ that perfectly
captures a particular sense of melancholy
solitude. A garish and smeary gouache of 3
prostitutes from the mid-1930s is suggestive of
George Grosz, or even Jack B. Yeats. By the mid-
1940s his style is more abstract and expressive,
‘like close-ups of a fire seen through a grate’
according to John Berger. The colours are bold
and garish (Gerald preferred to paint by electric
light), the execution exaggerated, the subject
matter obscure yet intensely felt – ‘an art’ said
David Sylvester ‘which has the exhilaration of a
disaster just averted’. Yet there is often an
innocent, impish humour there too in his twisty
rope dancers, lumpy spacemen, and many
legged clowns. ‘My life may be miserable’
Gerald once said ‘but I’m not’. Helpless and
disorganised as he often was, he was also
capable of working with great concentration for
long periods. He worked to commission and, in
company of some other major talents
(Sutherland, Nash, Topolski), produced some
delicately executed designs for Z. Ascher, the
textile manufacturer, one of which was worn by a
young Princess Elizabeth on the Royal Tour in
1947.
As I found recently it’s hard to come by examples
of Gerald’s work. There just isn’t much around.
The Tate has 3 of his paintings; most of the rest
are with the October Gallery, long the guardian
of his flickering flame. Given such scarcity it’s
tempting, though wrong, to mythologise this
wayward contender who lucked out to his more
successful contemporaries rather than
acknowledge him as the creator of a unique,
visionary, and courageous body of work.
Because for all that he suffered and lost, he
survived a lot longer than many others of his ilk. ‘I
won out! I won out’ he once claimed triumphantly
‘They said alcohol would kill me but I defeated
alcohol.’ Maybe, in the end, that was true.
So here’s to Gerald Wilde, unjustly overlooked,
who once startled me in a kitchen full of Sufis a
long time ago.
William Morrison-Bell
May 2012
SIMONE 'PINGO-PONGO' MARTINI
fond renewed interest after his death n 1948, xxxx
growing interest in Primitive Art. In November
1954
father xxxx sr was a professional basketball
made collages out of trash. For the first time he
xxxx has his first solo show at the Seven Stairs
and chalk in place of brushes, subverting the
player who later worked as a golf and swimming
saw the work of Alberto Giacometti and in 1948,
Gallery in Chicago, supported by Robert
distinction between painting and drawing. In
instructor. During his early baseball career xxxx’s
he enthusiastically cut a picture of Jean Dubuffet’s
Motherwell with a text for the exhibition brochure.
August he was discharged from military service
1952
1928
xxxx was born on April 25th 1928. His
father was nicknamed xxxx after the legendary
‘Smoky Black (lili)’out of a magazine.
pitcher xxxx and this moniker was passed over to
1949
his son.
Xxxx took the Winter course at xxxx
and moved into a small apartment in Lower
college and in May travelled with xxxx through
Manhattan. He made new paintings, of which
returned to Virginia and enrolled in Lee
the South of The United States and to Cuba.
only one survives. The canvases recall Jackson
university, which offered a course in art for the
During the Summer he visited Black Mountain
Pollock with their thick weave of strokes. Some
was a copy from Pablo Picasso, based on the
first time that year.
College were he met John Cage, Franz kline and
sculpture was also made that year, including
portrait of Marie-Therese Walter reproduced on
1950
Jack Tworkov who were teaching there that
wrapping found materials with wire and string,
the jacket of Jean Cassou’s Picasso monograph,
to study at The Arts Students League under Will
Semester. With the help of a travel grant from the
still showing clear African influences.
which xxxx had been given for his 12th birthday.
Barnet, Morris Kantor and later Vaclav Vytlacil.
Virginia Museum of Fine Art, xxxx undertook an
1955
1942
1940
The first picture he remembers painting
At the insistence of his parents xxxx
Xxxx began increasingly to use pencil
In September xxxx moved to New York
In January, xxx‘s first solo show opened
More than by his classes, he was impressed by
extended journey with xxxx to Europe and North
in New York at The Stable Gallery. For a short
participated in classes and lectures given by
the metropolis where the entire range of
Africa. They also visited Rome, Florence, Siena,
period he took on a teaching post in Buena Vista.
Spanish artist Pierre Duaura, who had previously
contemporary art was present. He saw the Achile
Assisi and Venice, continuing their journey to
He planned a second visit to Paris, Egypt and
been active in Paris with artists including Kurt
Gorky retrospective at the Whitney Museum of
Morocco.
Greece but his visa was turned down. He
Schwitters in the group Cercle et Care, and who
American Art and constantly visited exhibition
1953
was now teaching 20th European painting.
openings of prominent artists including Jackson
to Rome. In a joint show in Florence in May, xxxx
Island where he met Jackson Pollock, shortly
1944
Pollock, Robert Motherwell, Willem de Kooning
showed tapestries made of bright African fabrics,
before his death in a car accident.
him a copy of Sheldon Cheney’s ‘A Primer of
and Franz Kline. He was introduced to artists and
before returning to New York with a wealth of
1957
Modern Art (1927) which he devoured. In this
asked to visit their studios. In the second semester
impressions. Xxxx now often worked in xxxx’s
Betty di Robilant in Grottaferrata South of Rome.
book Cheney emphasises the primacy of
he met fellow artist xxxx, who xxxx claims was the
studio a well as help is renovate the basement of
It was here that he began reading Stephane
expressionism over geometric abstraction in the
first artist his own age who shared interests and
the newly founded Stable Gallery where they had
Mallarme, whose symbolic white was to become
development of modern art movements
artistic views., and who was to remain a friend for
a joint show in September. Xxxx’s pictures
an important reference point in his own work.
1947
Over the next four years he
For his 17th birthday, his mother gave
The two artists travelled via Spain back
occasionally visited Conrad Marca-Relli on Long
In February, xxxx visited his old friend
decades. Xxxx was included in a group show at
showed phallic shapes and bunches of hairy tufts
Attracted by the bright sun, he decided to extend
xxxx happened upon a Summer colony of artists
the League and even received an offer for a solo
which can be traced back to drawings made at
his stay, renting a house on the island of Procida
and painted several pictures which he described
show, which he turned down.
the ethnographic museum in Rome and which
for July and August. Here he met Tatiana
as ‘abstract seascapes’.
1951
were named after North African villages. For the
Franchetti who worked as a portrait painter and
1948
While visiting his aunt in Ogunquit,
On xxxx recommendation, xxxx
registered for the Summer course at xxxx college,
first time he drew into wet paint, creating a
who was to become his wife, and her brother
studies at the school of the Museum of Fine Arts
where he visited painting classes by Ben Shahn
strongly lined surface. Late in the fall, xxxx was
Giorgio Francetti, who was among the first
in xxxx where the focus in the late 1940’s was on
and Robert Motherwell and experimented with a
called up for military service and trained in
promoters of American Art in Europe and was to
German Expressionism. Oscar Kokoschka and
pinhole camera during photography courses
cryptography at camp Gordon near Augusta.
introduce xxxx to art world circles in Rome. …
Max Beckmann visited the Museum school
given by Hazel-Freida Larsen. In the late Summer,
At weekends in his hotel room he would draw at
during xxxx’s time there and he showed an
his increasingly static and symmetrical black-
night under bright lights to disrupt the academic
interest in the work of Lovis Corinth and Chaim
and-white pictures reflected the paintings of Franz
training of his hand and develop his own mode of
Soutine. Inspired by Kurt Schwitters, whose work
Kline, and his fissured surfaces reflected a
expression.
In the fall of 1947 xxxx begins his
GREVILLE WORTHINGTON
A puff
for
Puffin
The illustrator Kaye Webb was the second editor
of Puffin Books. She succeeded Eleanor Graham,
who built the imprint over the 40s and 50s and set
has done anything similar.’
Many of these artists (including Searle who, as
a POW, was a slave labourer on the Burma
high standards of commission,
Railway**) were touched by the
illustration and design. Webb’s
World Wars. Their work seems to
tenure lasted from 1961 to 1979
belong in one of two categories.
and marked a huge expansion of
Either
the company’s imaginative
a sense of, ‘we have survived –
scope and catalogue. What we
let’s celebrate!’ or an intimation of
might call the heyday of Puffin
something altogether darker.
helped shape the reading of
Charles Keeping’s contorted
countless baby-boomers;
visualisation of Grendel in
sometimes even their children.
Dragonslayer (by Rosemary
For many of us, however, the
Sutcliff), for example, shows how
illustrators she commissioned or
vividly conflict and drama can be
revived were an introduction to
expressed in pen and ink.
visual art that was free from
Hugh Lofting, author and
prescription, full of drama and always
illustrator of Dr Dolittle***, used his fictional
pleasurable. They are my choice of unsung or
character as a mechanism to blank out the
overlooked artists.
horrors of trench warfare. The illustrated letters
Arguably the best-loved cartoonist in Britain, the
that he sent to his two sons during the First World
late Ronald Searle, was married to Webb*. In his
War describe a fantasy world and are the
recent obituary of the artist, Quentin Blake
foundation of his immensely popular stories. They
observed: ‘… as far back as 1973, there was a full-
were later made into a book, described by the
scale exhibition of his work in the Bibliotheque
poet Hugh Walpole as a ‘work of genius’.
Nationale in France: no major institution in Britain
* Illustrator of St Trinians and Molesworth.
Published by Penguin, but selected by Webb as a
Henry Williamson, working as an odd-job man in
husband, so perhaps an honorary Puffin Artist.
Exmoor, wrote the book while trying to raise a
**See also Searle’s drawings of life in a Japanese
family in rural poverty. ‘Tarka’ was an overnight
POW camp. ***First published by Jonathan Cape
success when it first appeared in 1927 and
in 1922 and by Puffin in 1967.
Webb’s incisive judgement struck again for its
JRR Tolkien discovered Pauline Baynes,
1971 debut in paperback. Tunnicliffe’s wood-
illustrator of CS Lewis’ Narnia books as well as
engraved chapter headings capture the mood
his own. Dissatisfied by another illustrator’s
of the book and are now forever associated
efforts, he was looking around his publisher’s
with the title.
desk and spied some intricately-drawn medieval
Twin sisters Janet and Anne Grahame-
decorative borders which Baynes had sent in as
Johnstone illustrated another landmark of
samples. At the ‘Apocalypse’ exhibition at the
children’s literature: Dodie Smith’s ‘101
British Museum in 1999, I remember noticing that
Dalmations’. Working together in the studio, they
her designs were similar to very early biblical
passed their drawings back and forth until they
work, particularly in the way she depicted
were satisfied with the results. They went on to
monsters. Employed as a map-maker by the
work in early British television, bringing their
Ministry of Defence in the Second World War,
talent to the likes of Andy Pandy and Bill and Ben,
Baynes was the perfect cartographer of the
further imprinting their visual creations on tender
fantasy lands of Narnia and Middle Earth.
young minds.
Tolkien’s esteem for her work caused him to
There are many more Puffin illustrators who
remark, in double-edged but one assumes good-
remain unsung in this short article and I apologise
humoured fashion, that she had “reduced my text
unreservedly for omitting them (All the Editor’s
to a commentary on her drawings”.
fault. Yah! Booh! Hiss!) However, if you are
Edward Ardizzone, probably the best-known
interested, you might like to seek out the following
Artist for the imprint, lectured at The Slade School
Puffin Books: abetted, bejewelled and enchanted
of Art and was a regular exhibitor in London
by the finest illustrators of their time:
galleries. His illustrations for Clive King’s ‘Stig of
the Dump’ and Noel Langley’s ‘Land of Green
Ginger’ are classic indications of Kaye Webb’s
empathy for the relationship between the drawn
Walter Hodges: The Eagle of The Ninth, by
Rosemary Sutcliff.
Pat Marriot: The Wolves of Willoughby Chase,
by Joan Aiken.
image and the written word. Both are triumphs.
Anthony Maitland: The Leon Garfield novels.
Born in Haipong in 1900, Ardizzone became an
Diana Stanley: The Borrowers, by Mary Norton.
official War Artist in 1940 and was famously
Tove Jansson: The Moomins.
arrested as a spy by the Home Guard for
Tom Wolfe once remarked in ‘The Painted
sketching during the Blitz.
Webb’s choice of C.F. Tunnicliffe as illustrator of
Word’, his sketch of the Manhattan Art Scene,
that ‘…the public is not invited’. Kaye Webb
the Puffin edition of ‘Tarka The Otter’ sees her role
invited us all, Puffin Books are our books.
as artistic matchmaker at a most inspired level.
Chris Bell
MICHELLE ANGELO
ALDO 'QUATTRO FORMAGGIO' BELLINI
A LOST
EXOTIC –
THE
MYSTERY
OF HENRY
KEEN
If we think that authors and composers are
incense bowl are subtly conveyed, and a peacock
sometimes neglected, when their work deserves
feather’s black eye and faint tendrils are dimly
better, then they are positively feted compared
delineated . He lived mostly in London: and died
with some artists, and especially book illustrators.
of consumption, it is often said in Switzerland, and
The Imaginative Book Illustration Society (IBIS)
that seems (to judge from the usual sources) to be
was founded a few years ago try to redress this a
all we know of him.
little, but will admit the work has barely begun.
In the hope of finding out a little more, I sent off
There have been a few useful studies in the field,
for a copy of Henry Keen’s will. It is very brief,
such as Fantastic Illustration & Design in Britain,
leaving six books of his choice to his brother, of
1850-1930 by Diana L. Johnson (1979), a
300 High Holborn, and the rest to Victoria May
cornucopia of rare work and forgotten artists. But
Barnes, who shared Keen’s then address,
quite a few of the biographical notices even in this
“Westwood”, Walberswick, Suffolk. The will was
remark “very little known is about the artist’s life”
dated 25 June 1935: and he died the next day. The
or some such variation, demonstrating how soon
witnesses were R G Barnes of Southampton, and
even the barest detail of an illustrator’s existence
R E E Hadlow, a Merchant Marine Officer, of,
are lost.
Warley Lodge Farm, Nr Brentwood, Essex. The
Amongst those of whom this is said is Henry
estate was valued at £208-13-9. When his brother
Weston Keen (1899-1935), who illustrated a highly
registered the will, one month later, on 26 July
desirable edition of Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian
1935, he gave the farm address (in “Little
Gray, as well as an equally admired book of
Warley”) too: the witnesses were probably his
Jacobean tragedy, Webster’s The Duchess of
friends.
Malfi &The White Devil: and a few other books,
So it will be seen that Keen did not die in
mostly for the former Eighteen Nineties publisher,
Switzerland, as some sources say, but in Suffolk:
John Lane.
Walberswick was then a well-known artists’
The British Museum has a lithograph by him
retreat. Still, this does not tell us very much more,
(left), ‘Ming & Incense’, in which the serenity of
and as the summation of the estate of a promising
the idol and the slow tendril of smoke from the
and admired artist it has a certain poignancy.
What lay behind that bequest of six books
illustrators did, and he was designing books for
(evidently meant as a memento mori): why six?;
Beardsley’s main publisher. We do not know if he
and which six did his brother choose? What other
chose the titles he illustrated, or they were
books were there and what became of them?
commissioned by the publisher, but they were
Who was Victoria May Barnes: lover, companion,
clearly intended to let him indulge an interest in
nurse, friend? And what comprised that £208
the fantastic and weird, especially in depicting
estate (worth about £11,000 today)? Did it include
wilting dandies, femmes fatales, votaries of the
a Chinese statuette (though not Ming) or a
voluptuous and jaded gods. Certainly his work
delicate incense bowl or were these copied from a
was much admired by connoisseurs, including the
museum or conjured from the imagination? What
austere T.E. Lawrence, who provided an
became of his unpublished drawings?
introduction to one of the books. And yet for all
The British Museum Quarterly Volume 10,
the decorative and decadent glamour of his
Number 3, March 1936 (p. 144) records that a gift
designs, there was also often a delicate
of: “Thirteen lithographs, two lino-cuts, and one
glimmering, which hinted at secret depths. He
etching” and these were “Presented by Miss V.M
seemed to have an especial skill in evoking
Barnes through Mr Arnold Keen”. The British
shades of grey, with ethereal, veil-like effects.
Museum on-line database quotes a Miss M V
And those shades and veils, alas, have gathered
[sic] Barnes “(British; Female; 1935; active)” as
over him too, for over seventy years.
“the beneficiary of the estate of Henry Weston
Keen, and donor of a large group of his work to
Bibliography
the Museum in 1935 through the executor Arnold
The Twilight of the Gods by Richard Garnett (John
Grey Keen”. If the artist’s work was donated,
Lane, 1924). Introduction by T.E. Lawrence. 28
rather than sold, that perhaps suggest Miss
illustrations: and ornaments in the text.
Barnes was not in financial need. Or perhaps she
and the artist’s brother were keen to perpetuate
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (John
his memory, and selected the best of his work to
Lane, 1925).12 full page illustrations: and
offer to the Museum.
ornaments in text.
Certainly this did not represent all of his
surviving work. A set of lithographs listed as
Zadig & Other Romances by Voltaire (John Lane,
“Adam, Serpent and Apple; Reclining Nude with
1926). 11 illustrations: and numerous sketches and
Peacock; Peacock and Man’s Head: Female Nude
ornaments
with Skulls; and Lady by a Fountain”, some
signed in pencil and one dated ‘22’, were sold at
The Duchess of Malfi & The White Devil by John
Christie’s in 1995. But there have not been many
Webster (John Lane, 1930). 11 illustrations: and
other publicly recorded sales since.
tail-pieces.
Henry Keen’s work was subtly exotic. He did not
escape the influence of Beardsley in his images
and his interests, but then few early 20th century
Mark Valentine
The
Painted
Shed
square meal. Tom didn’t compromise: he painted
made for a difficult situation: if I protested I didn’t
sheds and their environments. That was it.
want his paintings (which was true), he’d be even
The paintings normally included a green keeper
angrier. The only way I could get them back into
or two, standing a little stiffly, dressed in fusty
Mark’s hands was to lose them in another game.
garb and holding aged tools. I thought they were
Mark however, in righteous fear of losing even
probably very good. Mark, a man of some taste,
more heavily, was reluctant to play. With Tom’s
certainly did, but I hated them. They were large:
words burning in his ears, he was ashamed to
typically six foot by four and mostly shed. One
follow such a trivial pursuit. Things were tense.
turned up every six months or so, Mark would
Every time I passed through the hall, an
buy and duly hang it in the large flat we shared in
unavoidable and frequent occurrence, the sheds
Beckenham. There were four of Tom’s paintings
glowered at me accusingly.
on the landing.
I haunted suitable-looking galleries and searched
We spent our time watching Bergman and
for collectors who might take to the paintings. I
Bunuel, pretending to read ‘Being and
wrote to unknown Americans, enclosing
Nothingness’, discussing the nature of reality, and
photographs and trying in vain to talk up the
gambling. We perfected the art of Vingt-et-Un.
virtues of the sheds. No one was interested.
I last saw Mark in ’67. We went mountain
Frequently penniless, we became adept at
Everything seemed to confirm my belief that they
climbing just before I went away. He was a man of
transferring value onto any immediately handy
were worthless.
many talents: photographer, writer and musician.
object. ‘Let’s call this dog-end sixpence’ and so
Mark and I went on our trip to the Lakes. We
He scandalised local folk clubs with his rendition
on. It soon caught on. I once hoarded a box of
climbed Scafell, marvelled at the dark depths of
of the First World War ditty ‘Where Are The Boys
matches for weeks waiting for them to turn,
Wast Water and imagined we were poets, which
magically, into the shillings I had won.
was true in Mark’s case. We risked exposure with
girls to dress up and take part in outlandish
One evening Mark, on a losing streak, negotiated
unsuitable clothes, drank in Lakeland pubs and
scenarios he recorded on film. He wrote a thesis
Tom’s paintings into the pot. We finally settled on
revelled in our youth. Then Her Majesty
on Kalahari Bushmen centred around the
five pounds, and then betted on shares of a
intervened. We lost contact and I found concerns
haunting line; ‘There is a dream dreaming us’.
painting. Idler than Mark, I had more time to
other than art ownership to preoccupy me.
Mark supported many hopeless causes, myself
devote to cards and beat him consistently. This
I lied at the beginning. I did see Mark once more;
among them, but his major charitable concern
particular evening, I enjoyed spectacular success
briefly, in a North London flat in the mid-nineties.
was Tom.
and ended up owning the four paintings in the
None of it meant much by then, we’d spent too
Tom was a painter and Mark his only collector.
hall. I’m not sure who was more dismayed, Mark
much of our lives apart. What struck me though
Tom painted green keepers’ huts: the simple kind
at losing them, or me for landing so hated a
was the painting on his wall. It was magnificent. I
you find on bowling greens, nothing grand or
trophy. We took it all quite seriously though,
couldn’t stop looking at it. A profoundly human
crickety. I’m pretty sure he lived in one. He made
otherwise the game would have lost its salt.
vision with all pretence carved away, plainly an
a small living as an apprentice green keeper. A
Not, I fear, as seriously as Tom, who regarded
investigation into the nature of perception by a
taciturn man, the only subjects which brought him
gambling as a pernicious vice. When he
master. Its powerful calm pervaded the large
to life were painting and the minutiae of grass
discovered his paintings had changed owner, he
room. A humble shed with two green keepers
maintenance. He must have lived cheaply since
went ape-shit. I was astonished to hear such a
and their simple tools.
Mark had little money then and the price of each
naturally quiet man rave at me. I might have well
Healey Cleugh, 2012.
painting can’t have been much more than a
as stolen his girlfriend, not that he had one. It
By John McEvoy
of the Village Tonight?’ He persuaded
PAINTERLY SHADOWS
Jeremy Deller’s work.
Unintelligible cartoons in 2080?
Beware the elbow of history,
warns Hugh Buchanan.
A minister once asked a young artist why he
fetched huge sums. When he died at his Roman
Titian and Rembrandt, and so it went on up to the
subterranean level and a recent Munnings
never went to church. “Oh I don’t believe in God”
Palazzo in 1793 the list of his effects ran to 100
pre Raphaelites whose sophisticated whimsy was
auction price of £5 million puts the work of many
said the artist. “Well” said the minister
pages and included no less than 60 old masters.
elbowed out by the scumbled abbreviations of the
of his adversaries in the shade.
“All that is required is a little faith”
But he was totally eclipsed by Girtin and Turner,
Bloomsbury Group.
“I need more than that” said the artist “I require
those painters of feeling, who replaced his formal
evidence”
By1946 this natural ebb and flow had produced
And what of the contemporary art scene ? The
late Gerald Laing compared it to the the film Toy
approach with Romanticism. Now he does not
a very eclectic mix indeed. On one hand there
Story where the big hand (Charles Saatchi) picks
”But you have faith in your own talent don’t you?“
even merit an entry in the dictionary of artists. Or
were the modernists, Henry Moore, Barbara
figures at random and propels them to the
“Of course” said the artist.
what of Julien Bastien Lepage?
Hepworth and Ben Nicholson and on the other,
limelight. Young artists sit eagerly at their degree
the drawing-room artists , Sir Alfred Munnings,
shows, like the toys, waiting for that giant hand to
19th century Paris he painted Sarah Bernhardt’s
Sir William Russell Flint and Edward Seago,
pick them up. Their work may be good because it
portrait but is now reduced to a footnote in the
Surely a war had not been fought to enable Sir
is good or good because it is bad. It doesn’t really
assume that like so many of the students who
history books as an influence on the Newlyn
Alfred Munnings to go on painting pictures of
matter and nobody can tell any more. It appears
have emerged from the art colleges over the past
school and the Glasgow Boys. Pity also poor
huntsmen? Critical theory dictated otherwise.
to be pure chance. You can understand why those
decades he is now a forgotten artist.
Franz Lembach, the artist who painted Wagner
The establishment began to panic and so in 1946
who have been initially overlooked feel sure that
and who left his house to the city of Munich as a
with the introduction of the Arts Council the state
their turn will come later.
consolation that history might shuffle the pack
memorial to his treacly brown portrait oeuvre.
began to take a hand
differently and that those who are currently
How would he feel now to know that the house is
overlooked will be recognised later on. With rare
best known as a shrine to a group of artists who
moment was the Royal Academy dinner in 1949
The Royal Academy Professor of Drawing. A
exceptions such as John Sell Cotman and Samuel
he would surely have detested – the Blaue Reiter.
when a drunken Alfred Munnings invited
professor of drawing who can’t draw. Perfect.
“And yet” replied the minister “ I see little evidence
to support that”.
I don’t know what became of him, but let us
And yet he was probably buoyed up by the
Palmer, history has not supported that thesis.
One of the richest and most celebrated artists in
We can only accommodate a certain number of
The battle lines were clearly drawn. The defining
We live in an age of irony and paradox perfectly
manifested by the appointment of Tracey Emin as
everyone to join him and Sir Winston Churchill in
Those of us who deliver a straightforward
Most currently admired artists were successful in
artists at any moment and as the Damiens and
kicking Picasso up the arse. It may not have
message can be fairly confident that irony and
their lifetimes. Van Gogh was on the brink of
Garys demand entry to the pantheon so the
seemed it at the time but this was a great victory
paradox will not travel well through history.
major commercial success when he shot himself.
Jacobs and Juliens will inevitably be squeezed out.
for Herbert Read and the other modernists . They
Journalists are warned by editors never to use it. It
Nevertheless the penniless Cotman and Palmer
Until 1946, collectors’ tastes oscillated in a fairly
were able to cast Munnings as a fool and from
just doesn’t work out of context. Any work of art
must have looked enviously at the reputation of
predictable way. In the 1820s paintings by Guido
that moment the art world was polarised. Sir
that requires explanation is at an historical
Jacob More. Admired by Goethe and a protégé of
Reni – the Divine Guido - were most eagerly
Alfred and his ilk were cast into the shadows. But
disadvantage. I suspect that the work of David
Joshua Reynolds, More was one of the most
sought for the emerging National Galleries. Now
I think it would be wrong to describe Munnings,
Shrigley or Jeremy Deller will be about as
fashionable artists of the 18th Century. His
he is very much an also-ran. His polished style
Seago and Russell Flint as forgotten. They still
meaningful to an audience in 2080 as Punch
polished landscapes in the style of Claude Lorrain
once again replaced by those men of feeling,
enjoy immense popularity at a samizdat
cartoons from 1880 are to us now.
“HE WON’T FIT
ANY OF THESE
BOXES, DEAR…”
A brief appreciation of Derek Boshier, by Paul Bayley.
easy access to art world curators and
works How to Make Left wing Jewellery of 1975,
tastemakers. In conservative Texas, the work
manage to walk the tightrope between hilarity
became increasingly political, taking swipes at
and seriousness with ease.
the petrochemical industries, the everyday
In 2003, as the US invaded Iraq. Boshier was
madness of celebrity culture and injustice.
horrified by the increase in pro -war rhetoric in
Making political points, even in his characteristic,
the US and produced a new body of work called
witty and elegant manner, was not a great career
99cent war. This also took the shape of an
move. A series of paintings which allude to the
installation a year later at the Florence Trust in
ending of the Waco siege and the burning
London where a series of giant monochromatic
oilfields of Kuwait from the first gulf war now look
wall drawings were undertaken in a church
prescient and brave.
setting. it was typical that Boshier just got on and
Derek, of course, wouldn’t openly make great
produced an instant, trenchant response In the
I have always had a special fondness for the cult
swinging London. Young, good looking and
claims for his own work but self-deprecating
face of an often deafening silence from the so
artist. They work without the glare of over-
talented, he found himself in the right place at the
humour is often the stock in trade of the
called radical young artists of the US and the UK.
exposure, often with a freedom that their peers
right time. With the benefit of hindsight you wish
overlooked. ‘If he doesn’t take himself seriously
I think this swimming against received opinion
have traded in for greater financial reward.
you could go back in a time machine and whisper
why should we?’ is the po-faced response from
has helped his longevity and continued relevance
Perhaps because of this they often out-perform
in his ear to stay put, keep on toeing the line or at
those bewildered by this approach. More
but undermined his reception as an artist. Whilst
them artistically but this freedom often masks
least become like his contemporary Peter Blake
damagingly, this can mutate into ‘If he doesn’t
his old mate David Hockney is packing them in
some form of wilfulness in their character that
and keep a single, recognisable and lucrative
take himself seriously maybe he doesn’t take me
with his current retrospective, there is no sign of a
prevents them from turning themselves into
style. Instead, he upped sticks and went to India
seriously?’ Juries, selectors and curators can look
Boshier revival in Britain anytime soon, still less
successful brands.
years before the hippy trail had become a 1960s
the other way when artists and work flatters. The
an authoritative, curated retrospective that his
version of the grand tour. Being a clever artist his
contemporary art world relies on a collective
career so badly needs. Like many other victims of
crucially he is underrated and if you become that
practice started to evolve. With a platform for his
suspension of disbelief so often that those who
class prejudice, Derek’s work plays better in
you tend to gravitate towards being ignored when
views, he started to use his art to make pointed
prick this pomposity are often shunned. It is no
Europe or the U.S. than in his native land,
the gongs are handed out and the art histories are
political satire. Looking like Michael Caine
surprise that his work has been valued more by
although he continues to show regularly. I was a
written. He came to prominence as a student of
impersonating Samuel Beckett and spending
cultural outsiders, like musicians. David Bowie is
teenager when I first unwittingly saw Boshier’s
the Royal College of Art in the early 1960s as part
some of his spare time dancing on the set of
his biggest collector and Derek collaborated on
work on Bowie’s Lodger album and it was years
of the British Pop Art movement, along with his
Ready Steady Go meant he was surrounded by
Bowie’s Lodger album cover, itself Bowie’s most
before I actually got to meet and work with him. A
great friend David Hockney. The Young
opportunity and distraction.
underrated record. He not only taught Joe
prolific correspondent, his airmail
Strummer at art school but subsequently
correspondence are works of art in themselves
Derek Boshier is not really overlooked but
Contemporaries show of 1961 caused a sensation
A quick way to become an underrated artist is
and his painting England’s Glory, 1961, is now
the refusal to allow yourself to be pigeonholed.
designed and illustrated the Clash songbook.
and point to another overlooked strand in his
regarded as classic English pop. He was also part
Experimenting with film, photography, collage
One of his earliest paintings titled Rethink/Re-
practice: Mail Art. His very funny anecdotes are
of that other revolution of British social history of
and print throughout the sixties and early 70s,
entry was mangled by that great student of pop
legendary and have a Zelig-like quality: whether
the time: the upward mobility of working-class
Boshier pushed his boundaries. By aligning
art Bryan Ferry for the very first track on the very
selling his car to John Lennon or sharing
talent through the medium of pop culture. Ken
himself with the fabulous but chaotic gallerist
first Roxy Music album as Remake/remodel.
awkward moments with Mark Rothko.
Russell’s film Pop goes the Easel, 1962, shows a
Robert ‘groovy bob’ Fraser was not good for the
However, glamour by association does such a
Sometimes, those artists who manage to combine
group of four RCA graduates, including Derek
sober business of building a reputation with
great artist a disservice. The diversity of Boshier’s
five decades of interesting work and a fascinating
and the beautiful, tragic and talented Pauline
institutions and collectors. Moving to Houston in
practice from collaged photoworks
life lived can allow themselves the last laugh.
Boty, larking around in monochrome pre-
the 1980s wasn’t a lifestyle choice that gave him
Contemporary Art Collector, 1972, to the postcard
SYD-TRACKED?
Was music just a blip in the painting career of Roger ‘Syd’ Barrett?
Asks Iain Smith.
According to popular legend, Syd Barrett was
drummer Nick Mason. By autumn 1965, blues
another band with lights. He saw them as a multi-
purist Klose had left and a new name had been
media installation on stage and, as the band
settled on: ‘The Pink Floyd’ (which thankfully won
developed their live act, a succession of friends
out over ‘The Meggadeaths’). With Syd now
and acquaintances were soon supplying slide
leading the band on vocals and lead, their r’n’b
shows and coloured lights. By summer 1966, the
covers started getting longer and more
band had acquired management and a full-time
improvised and Barrett’s eccentric songwriting
lights-man called Joe Gannon who was often
talent started filling out the set with originals.
seen as a fifth member of the band, playing his
For Syd, the guitar was always more of a sonic
array of theatrical style lighting effects as if he
paintbrush than a musical instrument and he
were a Brian Eno-type synthesizer player
loved playing it at random through an early type
smearing the sound with electronics. Although
of delay pedal called a Binson Echorec, an
San Francisco bands of this period may have had
at Camberwell Art College. Fellow students
electronic device that had originally started life as
lightshows of their own, only the Velvet
the ‘Crazy Diamond’ who invented Pink Floyd
remember him as being a keen painter with a
a GPO telephone answering machine. It was a
Underground in NYC were doing anything
then completely lost the plot and vanished into
particular interest in the works of Chaim Soutine
direct musical parallel to the way he loaded his
similar in terms of thinking of an integrated multi-
rock ‘n’ roll mythology. Well, that’s what the
(1894-1943) and Nicholas De Staël (1914-55). It
brush with paint and attacked the canvas back at
media installation within the context of rock ’n’ roll
music journalists and Floyd biographers would
may well be significant that both of these artists
art college in the manner of his current favourites,
performance.
have us believe anyway. In fact, music was always
were maverick figures in the development of 20th
De Kooning and Rauschenberg. In fact, art school
a secondary interest to Syd Barrett and his real
Century art. Soutine was unusual for being the
ideas were all the rage in British pop music at the
an event called ‘Music In Colour’ at the
story is one of artistic exploration and resolution
only noteworthy Expressionist based in Paris and
time (as noted in the Creation’s ‘Painter Man’
Commonwealth Institute in Kensington. As well
rather than a failed career in pop music. Before he
seemed to specialise in either grotesque impasto
single) and it is likely that the chart-friendly Pop-
as their audio-visual blitzkrieg, audiences were
even joined Pink Floyd, Barrett had been a
portraits of waiters, pastry cooks and the like, or
Art experiments of the Who were also a direct
also treated to a performance of NOIT, a mime for
committed young painter who subsequently
deeply reverential paintings of trees. Barrett, with
influence on Syd’s new direction. The Floyd took it
paper giants. The installation was created by the
applied many of his ideas about art to the band’s
his taste for both the weird and the pastoral,
all a stage further from records with a splash of
artist John Latham who described it as ‘a three-
music and stage-show; Post-Floyd, he just carried
would surely have found both styles to be equally
arty noise on top (such as ‘Anyway, Anyhow,
dimensional representation of Pink Floyd’s state of
on painting and by the time of his death in 2006
appealing. On the other hand, De Staël was a
Anywhere’) and soon, Syd’s rhythm chops and
mind’. They also played the first ever rock show at
had produced a considerable body of work, much
painter who started off working with pure abstract
lead fills became secondary to extensive
the ICA, which featured an informal discussion
of which is only now being rediscovered and
forms and yet found himself moving inexorably
passages of random noise. Pink Floyd’s
between the band and the audience after the gig.
exhibited in London galleries.
towards, but not quite getting into, the figurative.
improvised psychedelic sound was on its way to
It was all a long from ‘Louie Louie’.
This blurring of representation and abstraction
the stars.
Born on the Epiphany in 1946, Roger ‘Syd’
For example, in January 1967, the band played
Despite this radical fusion of music and visuals,
Barrett had enjoyed a comfortable middle-class
provides an obvious visual metaphor for the
upbringing in Cambridge, where his talent was
dislocation of meaning and musical structure in
being in a rock ‘n’ roll group and, right from the
business and abandoning his ambition to be a
soon recognised and encouraged. Some early
Barrett’s music as it developed, along with the
start, Floyd had their own light show, inspired
painter, but by early 1967, it was make or break.
work from his Cambridge days survives and
collected works of Bo Diddley of course...
(oddly enough) by their landlord, the college
Syd went to see Robert Medley, the head of
However, Barrett was not to be satisfied with just
Syd was very conflicted about being in the music
reveals a scattershot mix of influences on delicate
Searching for digs, Syd Barrett soon found
lecturer Mike Leonard. His hobby was building
painting at Camberwell and asked for a year’s
watercolours, violent Expressionist oils and jokey
himself sharing a house in Highgate with two
homemade light machines that were soon being
sabbatical. Whether he was serious about
Dada-esque collages. He did his foundation
guitar-playing friends from Cambridge, Roger
used to project over the band while they jammed
returning to his studies after a year of being a
course at Cambridge Technical College before
Waters and Bob Klose. All three played in a
around the house. Ever the holistic artist though,
rock star is debateable, but it shows that at least
moving up to London in September 1964 to study
student band with keyboardist Rick Wright and
Barrett realised that they could be more than just
the thought of only doing Pink Floyd as some kind
of temporary art project had at least crossed his
breakdown in the summer of 1967. By 1968, he
mind. It was certainly only part of his creative
was out of the band and, from all accounts, in a
outpouring of lyrics music, drawing and painting
pretty bad state. He attempted a comeback with
during this fertile period for him.
his two legendary solo albums, ‘The Madcap
Pink Floyd turned professional on February 1st
Laughs’ and ‘Barrett’, but his heart was not really
1967 and the rest is history. On-stage, the band
in it and he showed no interest in promoting them
were blowing audience’s minds with their
or doing any of the tedious but nonetheless
psychedelic lights, which by now had blossomed
essential things required to pursue a career as a
into a dazzling series of effects adopted from
professional musician. By the end of the 70’s he
theatrical lighting ideas and integrated with the
was back home in Cambridge and living as a
music by a primitive control desk. Their visual
recluse, whilst his former band-mates hit the big-
tool-kit included liquid oil slides, floor level
time as aloof purveyors of stadium-prog.
lighting to cast giant shadows behind the band
Contrary to the myth though, this was not some
and a dazzling barrage of filtered lights and
acid-fried retreat from the music world, but a
flashes. Some long-lost live photographs by
return to his true love of fine art. Barrett may well
Adam Ritchie were recently rediscovered and
have had one sandwich short in his mental picnic
exhibited at the Artisan Gallery in London and
hamper, but there seemed to be nothing wrong
show some of these vibrant homemade effects in
with his artistic muse, as he produced canvas
full-flight, looking quite unlike the anodyne
after canvas in the seclusion of his suburban
lighting rigs to be found at a rock concert today.
semi-detached in Cambridge. Many of these still
There is also a DVD, ‘Pink Floyd Live In London’
lifes, abstracts and landscapes were
which features extensive footage of their
photographed and then destroyed as part of some
psychedelic stage performances by the
strange auto-destruct idea of art that Barrett had
underground film-maker Peter Whitehead.
developed, but thankfully many were saved by his
Meanwhile, in the studio, they were working on
their legendary debut album, ‘The Piper At The
family.
Barrett had no interest in fame or the hassles of
Gates Of Dawn’. The wild improvisation of their
dealing with the outside world, so for years, his
live act was represented by side-openers
creativity remained unknown, but since his
‘Astronomy Domine’ and ‘Interstellar Overdrive’,
untimely death in 2006, more and more of his
whereas many of the other songs showcased a
work has been exposed to public view and his
more whimsical side of Barrett’s art, on delicate,
reputation has been sealed with a series of
almost child-like, songs about scarecrows,
exhibitions at London galleries and exposure of
gnomes and a mouse called Gerald. Their hit
his work on the internet – just Google slowly and
singles ‘Arnold Layne’ and ‘See Emily Play’
see! As his reputation grows, it seems that he may
weren’t bad either, cramming all the weirdness of
well have the last laugh, as he is acknowledged
their music into a couple of three minute wonders.
alongside Don Van Vliet (Captain Beefheart) as
It seemed that the world would be their oyster,
but alas, it was not to be, as Barrett experienced
his well-documented drug-related nervous
one of rock music’s true artistic talents.
ANDREA DEL SARTO
Hugh?
Jessica Maier
Hugh Bulley is a painter who chooses obscurity in
He lists his places of residence from 1964 as
single idea put to him.
That is why I am not sure it’s fair of me to try
Courage’ shows off his skills. These are just a
few of many series, any one of which would grace
and bring him the recognition that he deserves
a well-proportioned room in a palace or public
and encourage him to enter the fray at this late
building, should they ever leave the artist’s
stage of his career. He has always discouraged
studio.
others’ attempts to do so. It becomes clear that
In a parallel world he would be up there
the only people whose opinions he values are
between Bratby and Burra. In terms of
more used to hanging Hockney and Van Gogh
composition, he is far more satisfactory than
than an overlooked British painter who has
either. He styles himself a colour theorist:
trouble imagining his work hanging anywhere but
Hockney has nothing on him in this respect.
Burlington House! Surrounded by a small circle
Technically he is a traditionalist, still stretching
of fans (of which I am his greatest) he has done
and priming his canvasses himself. His many
preference to colluding with what he sees as a
Greece, Turkey, France, England, Republic of
away with disappointment and rejection and may
sketchbooks bear testament to his skills as a
flawed, corrupt art market full of celebrity-style
Ireland, Costa Rica, USA and
be happier in shade than limelight.
draughtsman, and the careful consideration and
artists and mediocrity.
Switzerland/Germany. Perhaps this peripatetic
Hugh’s main body of work of the last thirty
Bulley is a man dedicated to a lifetime of painting
lifestyle is a clue to why he never found someone
years, (the work that I wish could be seen and
collages give credibility to the final paintings in
without the gratification of recognition while he is
trustworthy to market his work for him: his deep-
admired), comprises several collections of
oil.
alive. Although old now, he is still busy working in
rooted convictions about the art market have
paintings which serve to narrate or illustrate. His
Apart from The Dramatic Paintings of Hugh
Germany where he lives and stores his many
prevented him from entering the arena, allowing
subjects range from the works of the great Greek
Bulley exhibited at the Ashmolean Museum in
canvasses. I am quite sure you will never have
him to build a protective world for himself, free
playwrights to Horace, Shakespeare, Brecht,
1990, none of these paintings have been on the
heard of him, despite the fact that his career
from criticism and upheaval.
Voltaire and Bernard Shaw. For the serious
market or seen by the public. The Centre
classicist these paintings will not disappoint,
International d’Etude du XVIII siècle Ferney
comfortable domestic life with his family, he was
bringing the writings of Aeschylus, Ovid and
Voltaire have used his collages to illustrate a
1938-1955 and afterwards worked for the
forced to put his painting first like many artists
Aristophanes to life with dramatic impact, while
recent publication of Candide. But even these are
engineers and shipbuilders, Vickers-Armstrong.
before him. In the 1980s he found the right
the highly-coloured imagery of his canvasses*
not the paintings, which remain unseen. His
He attended the Central School of Art in the early
environment in which to set up a studio near
has something to offer anyone who has an eye for
perception is that the series would inevitably be
Sixties and was exhibited at Wildenstein London
Zurich and to get on with the serious,
visual storytelling.
split up and hung separately if they came up for
in the Contemporary Portrait Society’s inaugural
uninterrupted business of painting for the next
exhibition with Duncan Grant, Augustus John and
thirty years. He has never mentioned a plan, or a
paintings in the ‘Prometheus Bound’ series by
Graham Sutherland in 1961. He was elected to
vision of who he is painting for, although he
Aeschylus, ten of Aristophanes’ ‘Lysistrata’ and
the Art Worker’s Guild in 1963 as Painter/
favours academic institutions.
twenty- nine exuberant works which narrate
Germany and it is hard to imagine anybody
Voltaire’s upbeat adventure ‘Candide’. The
persuading him to part with them now. I am
began auspiciously.
Born in 1923, he served in the Royal Navy from
Draughtsman and exhibited at the Royal
Compelled to paint and unable to sustain a
While one cannot help but admire a man who
To give an idea of quantity, there are four
preparation of watercolour sketches and bold
sale. Remarkably, he would rather not sell than
see this happen.
Hugh Bulley’s paintings remain in storage in
Academy Summer Exhibition in 1963. He enjoyed
has been propelled by such a passion (especially
visualisation of Aristophanes’ ‘The Peace’ (six
beginning to lose hope that this brilliant man and
a fair run of exhibitions between 1964 and 1970 in
since there has been no commercial subtext)
paintings) is a good example of his originality at
his work will ever be brought before an
the UK and in the 1980s was shown on a regular
others may not find it easily understandable. For
its best. Hugh is currently painting his eighteenth
appreciative audience to receive the recognition
basis in the USA. His work is well represented on
the archetypal agent who always wants to realise
series (Horace’s Odes).
that they both deserve.
the Bridgeman Library Art Worker’s Guild
maximum potential, the Hugh Bulley character is
websites and has been used in various
the ultimate in frustration: he resists all offers of
images of ‘The Birds’ and the unfolding drama in
*The canvasses measure approximately 750mm
publications.
help in marketing his work, and dismisses every
the twelve paintings in Berthold Brecht’s ‘Mother
X 900mm.
He uses Mediterranean colours in the five
In 1977 he described seeing “a difference
INTERESTING
POST
Rebeccah Morrill salutes
the memory of mail artist
Robin Crozier.
participants. It was important to Crozier that this
or less anything sent by mail – and MAIL ART –
was an “infinite” project, as he described it in a
where the act of sending the work makes the
letter to Clive Philpot in 2000: “Given its structure
work, it couldn’t exist without having been sent.”
it could go on forever.” To which he adds,
His project Portrait of Robin Crozier (1973-2001)
philosophically, “(what is forever?)… the project
exemplifies this. He sent blank postcards to artists
will continue as long as I am around and longer if
whom he’d never met, inviting them to create his
anyone wanted to continue it.” In the same letter,
portrait and post it back to him. The results were
he also admits to “sometimes cheating and
very varied, and full of all the wit and humour that
keeping the odd one”. It pleases me enormously,
characterizes this genre. I wonder what his
that even the most rigorous, conceptualist artist
postman made of it.
was occasionally seduced by the thrill of owning
Robin collaborated with some particular
I never met Robin Crozier and yet the
(optimistically glamorous) portrait he drew of me
Robin Crozier, would arrive in the mail.
Had I known then that he, like me, originally
in Fairfield Road, Bow, hangs in my hall in
came from Gosforth, I might have overcome my
Gateshead. I see it each day when I go to collect
shyness and talked to him at the opening about
whatever the postman has delivered. It seems
our shared Geordie roots. Furthermore, he
appropriate to be reminded of Robin Crozier –
apparently had an ordered-hoarder streak that I
best known as a leading British pioneer of Mail
can certainly identify with. The fact that had a box
Art – at the same moment as I invariably discover,
in his office labeled “particularly interesting
with a pang of disappointment, that there is
envelopes” just fills me with joy.
nothing exciting for me in the post. For he was an
I soon came to regret not having taken the
artist whose commitment to creativity, and belief
opportunity to meet him when in the following
in art as a life-force rather than a commodity,
year he died, sending the Mail Art community
ensured that something exciting came through
into mourning and abruptly ending a number of
thousands of letterboxes throughout his
collaborative postal projects that had endured
working life.
for decades.
I ought to have met Robin in 2000, when he was
Mail Art began in the 1950s and peaked in
one of around 60 artists in Live in Your Head:
popularity in the late 1980s and early 1990s. For
Concept and Experiment in Britain, 1965-75, an
some it was a radical political act to
exhibition curated by Clive Philpot and Andrea
circumnavigate, critique and disrupt the
Tarsia and presented at Whitechapel Art Gallery,
commercial gallery system, for others it simply
London, where I was working at the time. My
the most feasible way to distribute their work and
portrait was part of an audience participation
generate a critical dialogue around it, especially if
project whereby you wrote your name and
they lived in areas where galleries and other
address on a postcard supplied, added a stamp,
artists were scarce. I imagine for Sunderland-
and sometime later your portrait, as imagined by
based Crozier, it was a bit of both.
memories had been contributed by some 600
between ART IN THE MAIL – in other words more
the original.
individuals over extended periods, such as John
Not much more than a decade since his death
M Bennett, who worked with him via the postal
and his work feels likes a distant memory. It offers
service for over 25 years. One of their projects
a nostalgic link to a long lost world of
Chapters, consisted of a sheet of paper mailed
handwritten, pen and paper correspondence, of
between them on which they each added a one
considered responses, the patient wait for a reply,
line. When the sheet was full, it became a chapter
and, not least, of cheap stamps! Asked why he
and was published in Bennett’s magazine “Lost
didn’t make his life easier and use technology (a
and Found Times”.
type-writer, a computer), he emphasized the
My favourite of Crozier’s Mail Art projects,
importance of slowness in the act of writing and
which gives the most mundane of days a place in
the thinking time it allowed, which prevented
history, is MEMO(RANDOM) / MEMO(RY).
mistakes. It was the antithesis those “reply now,
Here the artist provided a blank card with the
regret later”, knee-jerk, cc’d to emails now.
words “What do you remember about…” and a
I have waited for the retrospective exhibition to
particular date handwritten along the bottom in
bring together and celebrate his artistic output in
his inimitable script. On the reverse: “please reply
public. It hasn’t happened yet. Perhaps this is
on this paper to receive another memory from
because it would contradict everything that Mail
someone else” and the artist’s address. The
Art stood for – being against the art market, the
recipient was free to write or draw whatever they
gallery system and art historical canonization.
recalled from that date. On receiving a completed
Perhaps the best memorial is to extend Crozier’s
card, Crozier would then copy or describe it in his
legacy, be that through continuing the projects he
own notebook, before sending the original on to
initiated or simply by finding inspiration in his
someone else with another blank card to be filled.
creative and generous spirit.
And so it continued, and memories were
*With apologies to Wanda for her omission –
recorded and circulated, with Robin Crozier as
which I hope may be redressed in a future “Alter-
the vessel through which they passed. By 2000, 17
Ego” themed issue of The Hotspur.
years into the project, over 8,000 individual
Greta Garbo, in a
little spikey frame.
oils by the prolific Anglo-Irish painter
W.A.Cooper. My grandmother. She was born in
the 1890s, studied drawing in Paris in 1910/1911
Ric Cooper.
(imagine who must have been wandering around
there at the time) and drove a horse-drawn mail
Long ago, in the days when I had hair and
van in Dublin during the Easter rising in 1916.
income, I used to buy pictures; once, perhaps
Through the twentieth century she mirrored every
twice a year, usually after consuming too much
move of her idol, Pablo Picasso, working in oils,
free champagne at a London opening, or possibly
crayons, charcoal, collage, ceramics,
as a favour to the host of a village fund raising
scraperboard and etching. Her cubist period (in
exhibition of local ‘talent’. I never bought
the 1940s) preceded her impressionist surge
complete rubbish, but my taste has proved a tad
(from about 1950) when, widowed, she had the
idiosyncratic for some of those with whom I’ve
Spanish surrealist Gregorio Prieto living in her
shared walls down the years.
cottage as a paying guest. Gregorio remains not
“I’m not living with that in here” she glowered,
at all overlooked in his own country, but here it’s
when I retrieved my John Hart abstract from the
an uphill struggle. I have a Prieto picture of
garage and put it back over the fireplace.
Granny’s house in Normandy (that’s the village
My father had a slightly better eye than me, but
called Normandy near Guildford) and a bizarre
only slightly, so our combined collection of dark
portrait of Greta Garbo by him in a little spiky
pictures of remote and desolate farm buildings in
frame. Winifred Cooper’s last house in London
wintry weather has to be lightened and warmed
was in Billing Street, Fulham, in the early 1960s,
for the pleasure of most viewers. To do that we
where I often used to stay as small boy, dropping
take to Mediterranean primitives with illegible
off to sleep on the camp bed in her attic studio,
signatures, interspersed with deft impressionist
breathing in the sweet smell of oil paint and turps
DOSSO DOSSI
and listening to the colossal roar of the Chelsea
increased in value, although nowadays it hangs in
LETTER FROM A HORRID PLACE.
crowd at adjacent Stamford Bridge.
the downstairs loo and I look at it in a somewhat
On the corporate lash in Beijing, with Tom Macfarlane
I have two splendid lithographs by Edward
different light.
Handley-Read, one portraying the interior and
And talking of light, there’s nothing wrong with a
the other the exterior of Arras Cathedral in ruins,
lavatory as a place to admire fine art. That same
shelled to pieces in 1917. Handley-Read (18691935) is severely overlooked. His First World War
pictures hang in the Imperial War Museum and
uncle, who had a Courbet over the fireplace, a
Constable in the hall and a Paul Nash in the
kitchen, hung two original Blakes in his. “Quite
Feb 2012
Peking Duck Restaurant in Beijing. So famous
Last week I found myself staring at a goose claw,
that the duck you eat comes from their own farm,
drunk. These things happen. It was detached
numbered. Our duck (I have the certificate) was
from the goose, had been boiled for several
about the four millionth and only a post-
hours, and I could see every bone in the it with
revolutionary duck. The restaurant started in the
anatomical accuracy. I poked it enthusiastically
1400s.
with my chopstick. ‘Mr Lin asks if you enjoy your
we were drinking Moutai. This is 53% alcohol.
‘Werry , werry much’ I replied. These things are
They showed me the bottle. We were toasting
each other, so there was no escape. The good
his portraiture is wonderful. He was never in
dark. Small window. Less fading.” he explained.
catching.
France as an official War Artist: he was a Captain
So I like what’s on my walls, whether the artists
the most horrible food in the world. And I am
in the Machine Gun Corps but his artistic skills
have been overlooked by the critics and the
were put to invaluable use designing and painting
dealers or not. One day perhaps. My family have
camouflage templates.
come into this a lot, so they might as well make a
I also possess two good paintings by Sophie Tute:
one large oil of Tuscany, one gouache of an
Oxfordshire field with a dog in it, nice, but clearly
final dramatic appearance. My nonagarian aunt
has recently moved into what will surely be her
last home, an admirably civilised BUPA
neither is worth a fraction of what I paid in some
establishment where charming staff provide cups
King’s Road gallery in 1988. As a wedding
of tea, buns and encouragement. My aunt chose
present in the 1970s my uncle gave us a woodcut
it because residents are welcome to bring their
of a naked nymph by his close friend and client
own furniture, pictures and pets. You go up the
Eric Gill. So grossly disgusting has Gill’s sexual
stairs to the first floor, along a corridor and into
interference of his daughters and dogs since been
her room. Bang. Bang. Bang. Christopher
revealed in Fiona McCarthy’s fine biography, that
Nevinson, William Russell Flint, Toulouse-
I imagine the little picture has marginally
Lautrec. Game over.
And just to give you some idea of the full horror,
banquet?’ said the interpreter.
The goose claw had been preceded by some of
thing is the glasses are tiny.
Mr Lin speaks directly. ‘Ftbb’ he says. In theory
trying to be fair minded here. Goose gizzard,
he has chosen a subject well. Soccer is a world
boiled. Sea cucumber. This looks like tripe, has
currency. I should be able to respond. Arsenal.
exactly the same texture but is more slithery. You
Man U . Even Sunderland. I should have tales of
got that. MORE slithery. Abalone, a special
freezing on the terraces , supporting my favourite
favourite of mine, actually makes me gag. It tastes
team with passion when I was a lad. Offers of
of bicycle tyre dusted in flour, so that you have to
season tickets I can proffer him for my Chelsea
chew it before it goes down. The abalone was
box, or that of my firm’s. But I don’t speak football.
teamed with the goose claw incidentally.
I speak other things. Flaubert, ballet, pictures, I
For those of you who have read this column
before, you will have gathered that I am what the
am doomed.
All good things come to an end, sometimes
Americans call a road warrior. For the British
even bad ones. As we reeled out of the
among you, that is a travelling salesman, albeit
banqueting hall, and I was driven off to my
supposedly on a grand scale. At the time, I was
somewhat second-rate hotel, I realised that,
trying to forge links with a Chinese petrochemical
however little, something had actually been
company. This is a vastly romantic business. It
achieved.
involves following a lead from a ferocious
I did now understand a tiny little bit of modern
Taiwanese lady into the senior ranks of the
Chinese culture. I understood that no one would
formerly state run company, and trying to
make a decision while the government changed.
navigate the politics of a labyrinthine
They understood that not all Englishmen liked
bureaucracy, itself in stasis because the Chinese
football. We all agreed that Moutai was a good
government is about to have one of its periodic
way to get drunk but that it was pretty horrible
reshuffles. Hence none of its lower echelons will
otherwise. A tiny bridge had been built, and in
make any kind of commitment until they know
another four hundred years we will understand
their future position.
each other quite well. The spirit of Marco Polo
I therefore found myself in the most famous
hovered around my bed that night.
THE PREGNANT FOOTNOTE.
Peter Bach recalls a brief stint working for Robert Fraser.
A rent boy nursed a cassette player by the
bedroom door as I entered Robert Fraser’s
Gloucester Road flat. He looked at me
menacingly and was off. I didn’t have the heart to
trip him up. Robert wouldn’t have minded, I told
myself. Groovy Bob, as he was once known, was
far more interested in Claes Oldenburg, Bridget
Riley, Ellsworth Kelly, Richard Hamilton and Jim
Dine. My job was to help a friend make an inventory
of the many works of art Robert had borrowed.
He needed to sell them to keep wolves from the
door. I worked for him hardly at all and yet the
wolves I remember so clearly. Not every visitor was predatory. One day
Francis Bacon staggered up the stairs, planted a
kiss on a thick brown envelope and handed it to
me as if I’d know what it was. With a sparkle in his
eyes, he said I was to give it to Robert when he
woke up. I did know what it was. It was full of
money, a gift. On another occasion, in the kitchen, Robert
presented me with a jumbled pile of drawings and
asked me to title them. Years later, I discovered
one of them with my caption at a major exhibition.
I won’t say where or whose. But I will say that this
former officer of the King’s African Rifles (whose
sergeant, according to Keith Richards book ‘Life’,
was Idi Amin) did enjoy rolling the odd grenade
along the floor. Robert rarely spoke to me. When he did, it was
with a slightly inaudible voice. ‘Rent,’ he would
say, ‘we need to pay the rent today,’ pouring
himself a brandy.
I learned later that this famous Swinging
Londoner was a butler’s grandson whose
Christian Scientist parents had sent him to Eton.
The only sign of religion I noticed was the trance-
like state with which he would enter the kitchen
after a smoky hour or so next door.
It’s Robert we see handcuffed to Mick Jagger in
Richard Hamilton’s painting ‘Swingeing London’.
It was most likely Robert who first showed John
Lennon and Yoko together*. For a time, he was
the zeitgeist personified. Not many people in
today’s art world remember him.
By the time I came along he was struggling. He
would sometimes dress up and go to Gaz
Mayall’s club on Meard Street on a Thursday
night, but more often than not people would come
to him. Which was how I met the late Matthew
Carr, his tall frame, gaunt features, and skilful
draughtsmanship somehow matching Robert’s
crumpled elegance. Through Robert I also got to
know photographer and writer Nick Danziger,
then a kind of neo-geo painter studying Mayan
culture. I grew close to Chinese refugee and
Vogue art director Barney Wan, too. Paul
McCartney was a good supporter and regular
communicator and Robert’s favourite artist at the
time seemed to be Brian Clarke, though I never
met either of them. After I left, he opened a gallery on Cork Street
briefly and I went to Afghanistan, losing my
girlfriend in the process. For his part, Robert went
on to become one of the first high-profile AIDS
cases in London. I write this in London these years later with
mixed sentiments. Perhaps there’s an ancient
cassette machine somewhere, still playing the
Moroccan music it blared out the night it left the
side of Robert Fraser, the Artist’s friend.
*It was ‘you are here’, at the Robert Fraser
Gallery, Duke Street, from 1st July - 3rd August,
1968. (Ed).