Glen Snow, 6:10 p.m. 15 August, 2015 #

As you have stated it is an ‘unusual show’, part of the effect I was certainly after, but I was confused by your sense that it lacked any cohesion. For my own part, I didn’t want to crowd the work out with my own interpretations, but I do object to the conclusion that their friendship and my ‘liking’ them might be all that holds them together. I have plenty of artist-friends I could have chosen from, but I picked these three in particular, because each represented a starkly different mode of working with paint from the other. Grouped together they reflect diverse approaches to that medium. Yet despite those differences in handling the language of paint, there was a clear interchange between the works aided by a shared geometric formalism. What became interesting in this shared space were the different trajectories to the calculations of those geometric figures.

Toby’s calculations, for instance are ritualised in a system of limits he places on his handling before he begins, and the specific scheme for each work is then painted on the back. They are paintings doubled in this sense. I was interested in your reference to Toby’s work as being similar to “spontaneously drawn cartoons”. I would agree that they have this quality, like some odd meeting of Philip Guston, Sydney Nolan, and Carroll Dunham, put through a blender with, as you have noted, a fair dash of Frank Auerbach.

The Thomas Demand reference to Ian’s work is well cited, and although I would agree there is something brilliantly ‘daffy’ about this work, I am not sure I would go so far as to point to Gyro Gearloose. In my own mind I think of the old ‘Boys Own: how to …’ books on model making. These paintings on paper – and Ian would insist that they are indeed paintings, which fold around themselves, and thus take up more space than is usually ‘allowed’ for such definitions – make references to parts of aeroplanes and spacecraft, while also borrowing the language of post-minimalism. They take their calculations from the world of aerodynamics.

The printmaking allusions are interesting in Diane’s work, although I’m not sure about the leap to ceramic tiles. Her geometry, a kind of Constructivist and Bauhaus-like calculation, plays on flatness at that liminal edge where it shifts toward an illusory and architectural three-dimensions before snapping back and slipping in its composition.

I noticed you subverted my use of the word ‘act’ in the blurb, as a reference to a ‘role’ for the artists’ to take up. My usage was to underscore the insistence of paint as a verb, an action, and grammatical imperative or command for those involved in its medium. It is true I aimed at an affective register by quoting Thoreau, in the attempt to speak to the commitment to painting by individual artists that in so doing extend it into interesting and at times unstable and edgy propositions. – Glen Snow

John Hurrell, 7:31 a.m. 17 August, 2015 #

Hi Glen. Many thanks for your comments and generous elaborative participation. My comments were mainly directed at the brevity of your essay as a lost opportunity for getting out contextual information - the background for the show. Many dealers (like Hopkinson Mossman, Michael Lett, Trish Clark, or Starkwhite) and institutions (like Artspace, St Paul St Gallery, Te Tuhi, Gus Fisher) do an excellent job of circulating this material, esp when it is online too, but some (like AAG) are surprisingly uninterested, even if it can be done cheaply. Wall labels need to be available in a portable format so they (the art historical detail) can be enjoyed at leisure at home as well as onsite. (Published catalogues can later extend this material further.)

Another 'chestnut' - the other side of the coin when thinking about use of language - is about 'liking' a work as sole motivation for curatorial inclusion or praise/condemnation in responded criticism. (I'm indulgently digressing a little here and ignoring the discussion about what one knows about the personality of the artist). Some of course say it is irresponsible (is no argument) to rely on the visceral, but I think that only applies in a situation where use of articulated language is the dominant method of response. Sometimes instinct alone is useful, and verbal expression might arrive later, with language initially not providing a cogent articulation. The argument might take time for the writer or curator to clarify - but they can be honest and admit it. (I'm digressing because I think it is very interesting, hence am throwing this out there...)