'And the Birds Began to Sing', Phillip King

Artwork details

Artist

Phillip King (born 1934)

Title

And the Birds Began to Sing

Date 1964

MediumAcrylic and metal

Dimensionsobject: 1803 x 1803 x 1803 mm

Collection

Tate

Acquisition Purchased 1965

Reference

T00737

Not on display

Illustrated companion

Like Anthony Caro, Phillip King was led to revolutionise his sculptural practice around the year 1960 by a combination of exposure to the new American painting and personal dissatisfaction with the figurative, expressionistic sculpture of the fifties. King's feelings were, he later said, brought into focus by his visit to the international Documenta exhibition in Germany in 1960 at which both kinds of art were strongly represented: 'The sculpture there was terribly dominated by a post-war feeling which seemed very distorted and contorted. Moore stood out with the English school ... And it was somehow terribly like scratching your own wounds - an international style with everyone showing the same neuroses ... The contrast with the American painting there was important too ... a message of hope and optimism, large scale, less involved.' In 1962 King began to make coloured sculpture from fibre-glass or sheet metal and embarked on an important series of works exploring the form of the cone, of which this is one… (read more)