Happy New Year!
Hello,
Seems too long since I last posted on here, apologies!
I think this is in part simply because I haven’t been generating very much new work in recent months. My time has been almost completely consumed with the creation of a new all-singing, all-dancing website, that I hope / believe will be a far more flexible / effective container for my practice online as we head into 2021.
I hope so anyway! It should be ready to launch within a month or so, although as I continue to work on new commissions for people, that date is slipping, inevitably!
So for now, I thought I’d jot down a few notes about Edition 17, and also share some thoughts on a reading list, just in case you fancy settling in with a good art read this winter, before the Spring arrives, and we, hopefully, get back to being outdoors again.
Fingers crossed for that. Both my parents have now been vaccinated, so there does seem to be real hope on the horizon that we may be able to get back to some semblance of normal by the late Spring? I’m hoping so anyway!
.
Edition 17
I'm in contact with a specialist Platinum printmaking studio, that has created works for Sebastian Salgado and Don McCullin amongst other hugely notable artists. I’m hoping they may agree to work with me on a Print Club piece, we’ll see.
If so, that will be amazing, to my mind! There’s a softened beauty in the platinum process, which captures layers of greys in monochrome, that the more normal silver halide process can’t really match. As I’m keen to explore and expand my own knowledge of the process, it seems like a great opportunity to work on something a little out of the ordinary, that may also teach me something about an aesthetic that I love, but have never worked on, to date.
I’m attaching a sublime platinum print here, that clearly illustrates the beauty that this process can capture. It’s also of note that platinum prints never fade, apparently, so it’s a form that may survive in your collection for hundreds of years, perhaps.
Coming home from the marshes, Peter Henry Emerson, Platinum print 1886
Reading List
I have to say that of all the things I’ve been missing, the opportunity to spend an afternoon in a good bookshop, thumbing through the extraordinary breadth and depth of books that are available nowadays, is pretty close to the top of my list of things I’m going to treat myself to, when once we’re allowed out again.
Favourite places to indulge in this activity would certainly include Hatchards on Piccadilly - https://www.hatchards.co.uk/ - the oldest bookshop in the UK, with an amazing art section on the top floor. And of course it would be ridiculous not to visit Waterstones flagship store in the old Simpsons building - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simpsons_of_Piccadilly - just along Piccadilly, whilst you're there. The RA is opposite, and just behind is Pace, in the old Museum of Mankind - https://www.pacegallery.com/
For another blog, I’ll put together a walking tour of some of my favourite private galleries in central London, always great to take in a dozen at a leisurely pace on a spring day.
So for this Christmas, I asked for a copy of Black Mountain College, by Helen Molesworth. Published by Yale and ICA. If you love modernism, and the Bauhaus, the Black Mountain College represents a subject of real interest.
From Wikipedia: In 1933, the Nazis shut down the Bauhaus in Germany, a similarly progressive arts-based educational institution. Many of the school's faculty left Europe for the US, and a number of them settled at Black Mountain, most notably Josef Albers, who was selected to run the art program, and his wife Anni Albers, who taught weaving and textile design.
Notable figures associated with the college include Buckminster Fuller, John Cage, Robert Rauschenberg, and many others. The book details a time of amazing progress and experimentation, by many of the people who helped to shape what we now think of as contemporary art, and as such it’s a great tome, with lots of good colour plates.
https://www.frieze.com/article/leap-you-look-black-mountain-college-1933-57
I’ve just found this podcast too, haven’t listened to it yet, but maybe of interest…
https://blogs.getty.edu/iris/audio-helen-molesworth-on-black-mountain-college/
My second recommendation is Seven Days in the ArtWorld by Sarah Thornton.
If you haven’t read it yet, I think you’ll love it. Essentially Helen Thornton takes the brilliant premise of dropping into the artworld on seven ultra-specific days, and catalogues what she discovers there. One of the days is a class at CalTech in California, to sample their approach to teaching art, which is fascinating. One day is a studio visit to Takashi Murakami’s studios ahead of a major show, on a day, if I remember rightly when his full team of over 100 assistants has downed tools over pay and conditions. Mostly conditions. It's a total page-turner, and a lovely insight into some of what has gone on in recent years.
https://www.waterstones.com/book/seven-days-in-the-art-world/sarah-thornton/9781847080844
I mentioned this one before, but am listing it here again. How to Be an Artist by Jerry Saltz. No doubt you have no interest in how to be an artist, but nevertheless, this super concise book lays out a lovely ground plan for suggestions, rules and thoughts on how to expand your thinking in ways that challenge existing orthodoxies, and may throw some light on to how to think more creatively. Grayson Perry is quoted on the cover saying he wishes he’d discovered this book years ago. It’s a lovely, light-hearted look at contemporary art thinking.
https://www.waterstones.com/book/how-to-be-an-artist/jerry-saltz/9781781577820
Finally, for now, I’m going to recommend Taking Art, Interviews with Artists since 1976, which takes a longer view of contemporary practice, through about 100 interviews with well-known practitioners, including Richard Deacon, Mark Wallinger, Jasper Johns, Anish Kapoor, the list is amazing in fact. It’s maybe a bit more serious than the previous three books, perhaps a little too Pseuds Corner for some, but a great read if you want to dive a bit deeper, and get some insights from people who have really shaped contemporary art over the past 45 years or so.
More soon! I’m looking forward to having some more news and images of the next edition to share with you. And of course, the new website, which has over 1,500 images, lots of copy, and maybe a little over 500 pages. It’s quite an endeavour, maybe too much so, we’ll see…
Thanks for your interest, as ever,
Best - Chuck
