A report on Frank Bowling's work at Tate Britain
More views of - or before - Cambridge Film Festival 2019 (17 to 24 October)
(Click here to go directly to the Festival web-site)
12 July
A report on visiting the retrospective of Frank Bowling's work at Tate Britain on Friday 12 July
#FrankBowling didn't do it for #UCFF, at @Tate Britain, but reminded of great shows at Tate Modern by such as Cy Twombly or Arshile Gorky : Bowling's do not repay in such manner an intent, searching and patient regard— THE AGENT APSLEY #ScrapUniversalCredit #JC4PM2019 (@THEAGENTAPSLEY) July 13, 2019
The retrospective exhibition at Tate Britain is keen to stress (Room 1, room-note) that Frank Bowling was at art school with Kitaj and Hockney, but it does not seem even convincingly curated (since, in Room 1, two swan-paintings are said to show influence from Bridget Riley, whereas a painting in Room 2 makes even more clear that the reference is Victor Vasarely):
Or, rather, is it that the art is, if not over-dependent on explication and an explanation of its place in the other things that occupied Bowling at the time, then probably - certainly for the first half of the show (Rooms 1 to 5) – then not strong or striking enough, so that those curating the show find themselves invited to give that level of information ? In other words, with a strong painting by Hockney, does it not speak for itself, and so one is not going to talk unnecessarily on its behalf ?
It is not exactly that one looks at a canvas of Bowling's and says 'So what ?', but almost not short of it, in that (everything else being equal, such as price, where it would hang, etc.) it is wise to apply a rule to the possibility of acquiring a work of art, which is that, whatever it says now, will it continue to have things to say when hung elsewhere and lived with ? : if the answer is that it is unlikely to continue to speak to the purchaser, then one might as well gather the initial or even superficial import now, and move on.
Simply put, in this case, it is not until Room 6 that anything compels one to prolong one's look, because - aside from what has been sometimes screen-printed into the fabric as detail - the work has principally uttered, and one would just be accumulating personal / biographical material. Or Bowling's poured paintings, which seem to compel no more than Damien Hirst's 'turntable' paintings, so a single look suffices : one looks longer, but finds / sees no more than at first. By contrast, #UCFF lived in the Gorky exhibition at Tate Modern for its last three days (a weekend that had been extended by the final day being a Bank Holiday) :
Not to say that Gorky's canvases are typical, or that Bowling stands per se to be judged for not being Gorky (since, in plenty of other ways, many artists are not a Gorky), but they in no way offered themselves up to an initial look, and each insight that was gained had the potential to send one on or back one or two Rooms to follow up the connections. Of course, Gorky is an extreme counter-example to Bowling, as exemplified by Rooms 1 to 5 at Tate Britain, but one can still ask what there is that actually arrests the eye here.
Didn’t know much about #FrankBowling until my visit to @Tate today. Loving his beautiful, detailed, textured, painterly surfaces. “It is clear to me that making things is influenced by my mother... She had magic fingers, whatever she touched... marvellous magic.” pic.twitter.com/CxKkZRBZJG— Rachel Moss (@particip8tion) July 9, 2019
From Room 6 onwards, and certainly by Room 7, the allusive quality is no longer a famous resemblance to Francis Bacon or to what may have been ghosted in with screen-printing, but to the nature and character of the picture-plane itself and, say, one perceives the watery quality of The Thames in a tessellated way.
Great Thames IV (1988-1989)
If you want to Tweet, Tweet away here
Unless stated otherwise, all films reviewed were screened at Festival Central (Arts Picturehouse, Cambridge)
