Photo: Richard Hamilton, Swingeing London (1968) - etching, aquatint, die stamping and collage on paper. Courtesy of the artist.
Kerry Patterson went to Glasgow's GOMA to see their fantastic collection of prints, which spans 40 years of modern and contemporary art.
Glasgow’s Art: Prints From The Collection 1960 – 2001 features work by some of the most significant artists in modern and contemporary art.
On display at the Modern Art Gallery in Glasgow until May 23, the exhibition includes pieces by Andy Warhol, Bridget Riley, David Hockney and Eve Arnold.
The works on show were produced using a range of techniques, such as etching, lithography, photography and screenprinting. Most of the artists use the printing process as an integral part of their artistic output, every bit as important as painting or sculpture.
Photo: an installation view of the gallery. Courtesy of Glasgow City Council.
Screenprinting was a technique Andy Warhol used often, as the quick, mechanical process was well suited to his prolific output.
Best-known for his prints of cultural icons and everyday products, Oyster Stew Soup is the kind of image for which Warhol became world famous. The distinctive white and red soup can label is now as much associated with Warhol as it is with Campbell’s soup.
British Pop Art also features, with the work of Patrick Caulfield and Richard Hamilton.
Caulfield’s subjects tend to be traditional, such as interiors or still lifes. His distinctive style of painting uses areas of flat bright colour bordered by heavy black outlines.
Hamilton’s work concentrates on topical events and imagery from the 1960s. Embracing different media and technology in his art, he was one of the first artists to make computer generated works in the 1980s. Swingeing London refers to the arrest of Rolling Stones’ lead singer Mick Jagger and gallery owner Robert Fraser in 1967.
Photo: an installation view of the gallery. Courtesy of Glasgow City Council.
Glasgow Museums have one of the largest collections of Sebastiao Salgado photography in Britain and the exhibition includes two photographs from the series Workers: An Archaeology of the Industrial Age.
Salgado travelled to five continents to take photographs for this series, capturing images of workers in different environments from all over the world. The pieces included in Glasgow’s Art show the Lada car factory in the Ukraine and two workers from a hydropower station relaxing in the sauna after a hard day’s work.
Photo: an installation view of the gallery. Courtesy of Glasgow City Council.
Another significant photographer included in the exhibition is Jo Spence. A British female photographer, Spence’s pictures are concerned with class and family issues.
After her diagnosis with breast cancer in the 1980s, Spence developed a technique she called 'photo therapy'. She used photography as a way of coping with her illness, taking photographs right up until her death in 1992 and producing candid pictures that were completely unprecedented.
Four photographs from the Metamorphosis series are displayed. Each picture contains two images of Spence’s face, which merge together over the course of the series. Metamorphosis includes images of the photographer taken after her death by her partner Terry Dennett, following Spence’s instruction.
With the balance of humour and serious issues explored by the prints, the wide scope of Glasgow’s Art ensures that every visitor will find something of interest.
