Sarah Lucas, Self Portraits 1990-1998, ‘Eating a Banana’, 1990. Iris print, 78 x 82cm. © the artist. Arts Council Collection, Hayward Gallery, London.
To celebrate its 60th birthday, the Arts Council has gathered together famous names in British art from its collection for a new show, How to Improve the World - 60 Years of British Art, at the Hayward Gallery, London until 19 November 2006.
Works by Barbara Hepworth, Francis Bacon, Chris Ofili, David Hockney and Henry Moore sit alongside those of lesser-known artists. The whole exhibition presents an interesting insight into the dynamic changes the art world has undergone since the post war period of 1946 up until the present day.
A particularly strong aspect of the exhibition is the sculpture on display. From bronze to fibre-glass, figures to abstract shapes, works by artists such as Henry Moore and Anthony Caro demonstrate changing attitudes to the human form and the materials used to represent it. I was particularly drawn to a bronze by Barbara Hepworth titled Spring. A bronze hoop had string stretched taught within the interior, representing for the artist: "the tension I felt between myself and the sea, the wind or the hills".
Lucian Freud, Girl in a Green Dress, 1954. Oil on canvas, 32.5 x 23.6cm. © the artist. Arts Council Collection, Hayward Gallery, London.
In order to see the progression and development of ideas and technique in British art, visitors might expect that this collection would be displayed in chronological order. However, the curators have favoured a different approach: rather than a thematic or historical arrangement, works from different periods are shown together, to suggest connections and affinities while as far as possible allowing each to stand alone.
So, whether it be Francis Bacon's chilling Head VI or the playful self-portraiture of Sarah Lucas, as you walk through the gallery you find each room has something visually stunning or thought-provoking to offer. On the down side, I did feel the arrangement of the art works was rather arbitrary giving the exhibition the feel of a disorganised storehouse. Often it was difficult to identify works without the aid of one of the five or so plastic guidebooks provided by the door to each room (not a very practical arrangement, I might add, when the gallery is busy).
Francis Bacon, Head VI, 1949, oil on canvas. 93.2 x 76.5cm. © estate of Francis Bacon/DACS
As I walked round the rooms, I began to get a picture of the type of artwork that is purchased by the Arts Council. These seemed to fall broadly into three main categories: the conceptual, the political and the multicultural. As long as the piece in question fulfills certain criteria, set, one felt by committee, it was deemed worthy to be in the collection. Sometimes in order to meet these specifications the quality of the art itself was of secondary importance.
For instance Peter Doig's Red Deer (painted in 1990) deals with the issue of how wildlife would be affected by the fallout from Chernobyl. Despite its good environmental intentions, I felt the work doesn't put forward its point with any clarity.
Donald Rodney, In the House of My Father, 1997. Photographic print on aluminium, approx 153 x 122cm © The estate of Donald Gladstone Rodney
Some of the conceptual works really shone at the art of the confidence trick. Bob Law's plain black canvas titled, Bordeaux Black Blue Black is accompanied by a paragraph explaining why it is a work of art; needless to say lots of big words such as 'ontological' were invoked in order to convince us of the value of this work.
However, there were some good political and multicultural works amongst the collection.I particularly liked Stuart Brisley's eerie 1=66,666 which comprised of a collection of 66 empty leather gloves hanging uselessly within a cage, representing the number of unemployed people in Britain at that time (1983).
Sunil Gupta's photographic portraits of the gay scene in India were both humorous and touching, one showed a wealthy Indian appraising a beautiful working class man from above, the caption read: "The difficulty of organising a gay group is the question of whether we should include the riff raff."
Anyone wanting to take a look at the key British artists who have shaped and changed our art world over the years should definitely come and take a look at this exhibition. It's also worth it to see works made by the artists who didn't make it to celebrity status.
