Archives of Innocence
Photography with letterpress, 2006.
New Man's Barn Art
Archival pigment print
and letterpress on cotton paper, 12.5" x 17.5"
2006, Westmount and Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
THERE IS always artwork one presents were one is left wondering: “Will anyone appreciate this.” As I mention on other occasions, it seems an artist can foolishly fall in love with his own work, and so casting his bread upon the waters, is unable to resist presenting the piece for a show. In my case, here, I had hung the above print with these cryptic lines of writ and an image of squash ball in a bag.
ADDING FOLLY to folly, I cannot here resist trying to explain the above work. Of course, it is meant to be riddle, so some would do well to abandon reading now and see if they can figure it out might just like it as it before I spoil things.
OTHERWISE, here it is: In 1990 the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa purchased a “1.76 million dollar painting” called The Voice of Fire, by minimalist painter Barnet Newman, a seminal work in American abstract expressionism. Its a massive work, consisting of nothing more than a big red strip on a black background. The NGC built a bigger-than-a-barn gallery space to showcase the work, costing taxpayers another good sum of money. Of course all this generated controversy with the accusation that “anyone can do that” said in the same tone of disdain that one might hear people say that photo-based work is “not painting” and somehow “cheating”. For many it seems no more than a game.
SO ADD THIS to an apparent non-sequitor with my reference to Ian McKewan's novel Saturday and its account of a particular squash game and you get my artwork and the verse. In squash its all about getting the ball above a red line on the court walls.
WHO, I thought—and you might think so too—would give a hoot about all that? However, I liked the image and text and the work went up in the show. One day of the show an elderly Montreal painter, named Nancy Dorrey, came into the gallery and was enchanted with the print. “Is that about Barnet Newman?” She had got that part. “I saw Voice of Fire. I went because I wanted to see what the controversy was all about. I was not expecting to be so moved by it. I walked up close to it and I burst into tears. It was marvelous.” I told her the rest of my story, she went out and read Ian McKewan's novel. Nancy returned a few days later and bought the print as a reminder of her encounter with Newman painting.
