John Stezaker & Art-Language (1973)
Two reviews: "John Stezaker at the Nigel Greenwood Gallery (23 October - 10 October 1973), and "Art-Language at the Lisson Gallery", 16 October - 10 November 1973).
artdesigncafé | café library | Published 30 July 2010
This review of two exhibitions was previously published in Studio International, 186 (961), December 1973, p. 248.
Readers of The New Art, the Hayward Gallery catalogue, and the letter columns of Studio International will be aware of the ideological dispute between John Stezaker and the Art-Language group. By a fortunate coincidence the protagonists were both showing in London last month, thus enabling the disinterested viewer to make a direct comparison of their respective solutions to current dilemmas. The casual visitor may assume that there is a similarity of approach since both present "machines" for learning: John Stezaker’s device, Mundus has been specially fabricated, Art-Language’s is a microfilm reader; both exhibitions are user-orientated and invite the viewer to share the artist’s experience; however, in purpose and mode of operation the "machines" are radically different.
In my view it is hard to overestimate the importance of Mundus (its programme is amazingly ambitious, nothing less than the "revolution to end revolution") because it demonstrates a logical mode of art theory and practice which offers a way out of the paralysis which afflicts so much recent art. John Stezaker’s emphasis on the fact that art is the product of conscious human deliberation and that artworks are primarily meanings or intentions restores to the role of artist a dignity which it was in great danger of forfeiting.
John Stezaker is generally described as a "theoretical artist" because he is concerned with theory for art rather than the theory of art. His output for the past two years has largely consisted of writings developing this idea, and his present artwork represents the first full articulation of the theory-practice synthesis which he advocates. His overall purpose is to reverse the usual order of priorities typical of Post-Duchampian art by moving from the abstract to the particular, by allowing theory conceptual precedence over practice and by putting "ends" before "means". Mundus— Latin for "world" or "system"—is described in an accompanying text Beyond Art for Art’s sake, as a "functionalist artwork"; that is, it does not describe external "reality"; rather it "prescribes to a world of meanings" and functions as an "exemplar for action". Hence Mundus is an "ideal type" which, like Plato’s universals, is to be apprehended by the intellect, in contrast to work presented to the senses. Furthermore Mundus is an "ideal type" in more than one sense; (a) it proffers a function for art generally, while simultaneously itself embodying that function; and (b), it embodies ideal interrelations within a microcosmic system.
John Stezaker and Art & Language: 1 | 2 | 3
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