Brighton Pierrots 1915
© Tate
Contents
Constable (1776–1837) made one of his characteristic 'six footer' oil sketches in preparation for Hadleigh Castle which he exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1829. The sketch has strips of canvas added at left and lower edges, the attribution of which has long been a subject of debate. A fresh technical study re-examines the evidence surrounding these compositional alterations.
It is most likely that Frances Hodgkins (1869–1947) began the painting Wings over Water in Bodinnick, Cornwall, in 1931 and completed it in London in 1932. Significant repainting was carried out, resulting in a thick paint layer with a textured surface, a characteristic feature of the artist's work. It is argued here that financial constraints had an effect on her choice of materials. Her colours, so often remarked upon by contemporaries, appear to be the result of a great deal of mixing and the use of surprising combinations of materials.
The essay traces military relationships in the work of Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968), paying particular attention to his notes of 1912 known as the 'Jura-Paris Road'. These are interpreted as 'military texts' and the author shows how military concerns remained with Duchamp throughout his career, resulting in facetious outcomes that obscured uneasy preoccupations.
Sickert's interest in popular entertainment extended beyond the London music-hall and his 1915 painting Brighton Pierrots depicts a troupe of vaudeville performers on the beach at Brighton. This paper explores the social-historical context of seaside Pierrot groups in England and the related European traditions of the Commedia dell'Arte and French pantomime
Jack Burnham’s systems aesthetics was one of the first, fully developed, critical theories of postformalist artistic practice. Yet Burnham, undeservedly, is little known today. Recovering, reprising and reassessing his work produces a richer reading of art production c.1970. It also suggests an alternative genealogy of contemporary practice.