Radical Art in 1970s Britain: 1976 (2002)

Excerpt fr. John A. Walker’s Left Shift which gives a year-by-year account of developments.

John A. Walker
Art Design Publicity 3(2) - Totally Walker | Published 12 August 2011

Radical Art in 1970s Britain: 1976


Cover image: Jordan in Derek Jarman’s film Jubilee, (1978).

In China, Chairman Mao Zedong and Chou En-Lai died; and the so-called “Gang of Four” was arrested. Jimmy Carter, a democrat, was elected President of the United States in the year that his nation celebrated its bicentennial. The Americans landed a spacecraft on Mars. In California, the company Apple invented and marketed the first personal computers. In Britain, Jim Callaghan became Prime Minister after Harold Wilson resigned. A sterling crisis forced the British government to seek a loan from the International Monetary Fund and cuts in public expenditure followed. Riots between blacks and the police occurred in South Africa and at London’s Notting Hill Carnival. Israel mounted the Entebbe raid to rescue hostages. Asian workers at Grunwick’s in London were dismissed and they then picketed the factory. Unemployed people organized the first “Right to work March” from Manchester to London. The hottest summer for 500 years caused water shortages in Britain. A “cod war” erupted between Iceland and Britain over fishing rights in the North Sea. There were Peace Movement demonstrations in Ireland and England. In Northern Ireland, the first IRA prisoners were sent to the “H”-Block prisons and the European Commission on Human Rights found Britain guilty of torturing internees. In the summer, 130 colleges, polytechnics and universities had occupations protesting about the closure of teacher training colleges. Bob Marley was shot in Jamaica and the Sex Pistols’ punk record Anarchy in the UK was released. Rock Against Racism was founded. Martin Scorsese’s film Taxi Driver starred Robert de Niro and Jodie Foster. Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford played reporters in All the President’s Men, a movie about Watergate. Sylvester Stallone played a boxer in the film Rocky. Derek Jarman filmed the Sex Pistols using super-8 and directed Sebastiane, a cult gay movie. Nicolas Roeg directed and David Bowie starred in The Man who fell to Earth. Clint Eastwood directed and starred in the Western The Outlaw Josey Wales. Nagisa Oshima directed In the Realm of the Senses. The Other Cinema opened its own cinema in Tottenham Street, London. Umberto Eco’s book A Theory of Semiotics was published in English, as was Solzhenitsyn’s Gulag Archipelago. The French writer and politician Andre Malraux died.

Arte Ingelese Oggi 1960-76, a British Council exhibition was held at the Palazzo Reale, Milan; the catalogue included Richard Cork’s essay “Alternative Developments”. The first issues of Artscribe, Art Monthly and Camerawork were published. “Art Magazines” and “Art and Social Purpose” issues of Studio International appeared. The Art Press exhibition was held at the Victoria & Albert Museum plus a conference at Sussex University, Brighton. An Artists’ Books travelling exhibition was organized by the Arts Council but a work by Suzanne Santoro was withdrawn because it included images of the female genitals. The Redcliffe-Maud report Support for the Arts in England and Wales was issued. Naseem Kahn’s report The Arts Britain Ignores was published and the Minorities Arts Advisory Service (MAAS) established. The Association for Business Sponsorship of the Arts (ABSA) was founded. The Acme Gallery was opened in London. A conference on Marxism and Art Practice was held at the RCA with speakers Laura Mulvey, Conrad Atkinson and Mark Karlin. At the Hayward Gallery a Festival of Islam took place and ’Sacred Circles’ a celebration of North American Indian art; R.B. Kitaj also organized the show The Human Clay. The abstract painter John Walker won the first prize at the John Moores Liverpool Exhibition. Sir Kenneth Robinson was appointed Chairman of the Arts Council. T. J. Clark became Professor of the fine art department at Leeds University. An exhibition of Terry Atkinson’s history drawings took place at the Midland Group Gallery, Nottingham. A John Latham retrospective appeared at the Tate Gallery and his paper “Time-Base and Determination in Events” was published. The Arts Council organized a large-scale show of Jean-François Millet’s peasant paintings for the Hayword Gallery. Carl Andre’s “bricks” at the Tate Gallery, Ddart’s pole-carrying performance, Mary Kelly’s Post-Partum Document and COUM Transmission’s Prostitution at the ICA provoked public contempt and press headlines. “Peasant paintings from China” was shown at the Warehouse Gallery, London. Victor Burgin showed at the ICA and John Stezaker at the Nigel Greenwood Gallery. A Festival of Expanded Cinema was organized by the ICA. The performance Academic Board, devised by William Furlong and Bruce McLean, took place at the Battersea Arts Centre. The Women Artists Slide Library was established in London. Maureen Scott painted a mural in support of Chile for the Peckham headquarters of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering Workers. A Performance Art Festival was held at the Serpentine Gallery and the Tower Hamlets Arts Project mounted a “Big Show” of community arts at the Whitechapel. Afterimage magazine published a special issue on “Perspectives on English Independent Cinema” and Stephen Willats’ book Art and Social Function: Three Projects appeared. Dawn Ades’ history of photomontage was published. The deaths occurred of Sir Basil Spence, Man Ray and L.S. Lowry.