Parachute, 1 décembre 1978, Hiver

[" tiMNN 27, 1971 T*\"* ***' : T* .jBBSfosp:- MTtlK IttltMl 0>J CHUT $3.00 HIVER 1978 Men island, where construction for further development is Th» »«* Tort Tbm&**» ho»\"»* now the subject of a many-sided debate all Dominance ofS.I.Plan Is Fought \u2018Populate Edges V By B.DRUMMOND AYRES Jr.arwcul t» Tï» NNs» 'foci T-.Wfs MASCOUTAH, ai, April î \u2014Like most Americans, La* rence Friederich has pick up and moved two or ÜJ times.Some of the places dates are beginning to now that he is 54 year* But one thing is stilt cl* Inevitably, he has drawn westward.At the moment, he 1 a 466-acre farm f about five mites ea?east ©f Maseoutan.F corn and wheat a beans and there s t not his white frit* not his -wife malm in the kitchen, n< tagging along Y tractor \u2014 that d hurTfrom any of other hard-worki farmers.Except that f a man from th reau drove up A said; \u201cThe way there is a pm that marks center of -th?In Census that point grees, 27 if N, and Lc minutes, \" ' In ever point is miles er w here a States pin if Î placed sented Amert the la ed or In gua?the?is t tht Fr et (< f lJICTlOx: \u2018V-U/f/c 26, l97} yl Mil \u2018««JL fti M f Fragments, Art Gallery of Ontario, Mars-Avril 1978, installation, construction en bois, 30\u2019 x 25\u2019 x 3\u2019 OCX nr«\u2014 TLXZJ.JZJÇl ¦BB m - m t msi «ïïïïlïi amWMWmmm PM râ INI ¦¦¦ watttÊtgtÊÈKggA «U=SU PP# ®f'm ® \"fL 4'' ^ \"jt ;X2' \u2019-J\t- sss us ¦¦iïïiw liügïüS] jüfplilli «liiliwil SU su H.***\u2019 W%m>Mm *S£^SiSSmsM& rrm rrm d±ü tttd \u2019 ¦ mm m#.'* mm 29 milieu, à travers une réduction de la réalité autour d\u2019eux, qui rend les choses plus manipulables.Je ramasse ces petites chaises, petites maisons, petits trucs comme ça.Ça fait partie aussi de ma façon de bâtir l\u2019image, de chercher, de piger dans un genre de jouai de la chose bâtie; une façon très propice de souligner ce que je veux souligner à travers l\u2019oeuvre pour que cela soit clair pour les gens.Dans Memo Series, il y a des choses qui viennent de partout: images, objets bâtis, objets de quincaillerie, objets de n\u2019importe quoi, tout devait nous dire quelque chose au sujet de l\u2019aviation.Une histoire de l\u2019architecture, mon travail sur le bâtiment héroïque, m\u2019a amené à travers le Québec, surtout dans la région de Trois-Rivières, la Mauricie et en Abitibi.J\u2019ai passé à peu près deux mois à trouver des exemples là-bas, des choses, vraiment du bricolage, du bricolage assez extraordinaire.De même dans la région de Calgary.C.P.: Quels sont ces objets?M.C.: Des maisons, des choses que les gens ont construites eux-mêmes ou des objets qui sont surtout marginaux parce que je crois que je cherche à travers la marginalité, un répertoire d\u2019images.Ce que je fais est tout à fait dans la voie principale de l\u2019art contemporain.Par exemple, je ramasse les images du passé que je vois un peu comme les déchets de la grande ville qu\u2019on habite et aussi comme des traces de mé- moire collective dans ce milieu naturel qui est le milieu bâti.C.P.: Au début de l\u2019entrevue, vous faisiez allusion à la situation de Montréal par rapport à des centres, des métropoles comme New York, Paris .comment décririez-vous cette situation par rapport à votre pratique?M.C.: Il faut reconnaître qu\u2019on pratique dans un pays colonisé culturellement.On n\u2019a pas le choix jusqu\u2019à un certain point.C\u2019est l\u2019économie politique mondiale qui définit ce qu\u2019est notre position et l\u2019art suit! Je crois d\u2019ailleurs que l\u2019on vit toujours dans un \u201crefus global\u201d, ici au Québec.Les choses n\u2019ont pas changé.Les mêmes jeux culturels que Borduas et Riopelle ont vécus dans les années quarante/cinquante se produisent maintenant.Il y a des artistes qui vont situer leurs oeuvres par rapport à ce qui se produit dans des métropoles artistiques, en croyant qu\u2019en reproduisant la figure de l\u2019art, ils font de l\u2019art.Ils ont raison, on fait de l\u2019art en reproduisant la figure formelle d\u2019un objet d\u2019art, mais étant donné que c\u2019est tout ce qui est véhiculé ici au plan culturel de la vie, ils ne vont que faire des choses naïves, formalistes, secondaires.Pourtant, je crois que l\u2019on vit à travers un changement culturel extrêmement intéressant maintenant.On a peine à le saisir.On ne sait pas quels sont les éléments du 21e siècle qui sont déjà présents chez nous.Je crois qu\u2019une chose que l\u2019on peut souligner et qui dépasse les métropoles culturelles est l\u2019existence de réseaux internationaux, comme par exemple pour Parachute.Je m\u2019aperçois que même si je travaille à Montréal, j\u2019appartiens à un réseau très international.Je travaille avec des sujets para-nationaux mais à travers une spécificité très aiguë.La plupart des thèmes de mes projets touchent le coin où je vis, pourtant ils sont compris à Milan, à Paris, ou à New York.Je suis compris pour ce que je suis ici et je crois que cela est une étape nouvelle.Je crois aussi que je ne suis pas seul, que ce phénomène est vécu par d\u2019autres.Cependant, ce phénomène n\u2019est pas encore reconnu dans le sens que l\u2019art qui prédomine ici est un art qui véhicule une vieille notion de nationalisme très paternaliste qui veut protéger l\u2019art québécois de la même façon que le clergé a protégé ses petits paroissiens à l\u2019époque.Mais je crois que cette attitude est dépassée; il ne faut pas polariser nos énergies là-dessus.Surtout, ce que nous avons à dire est aussi important que ce qui se dit ailleurs.Quant à être écouté dans les métropoles, c\u2019est autre chose; cela devient une question d\u2019autres structures de soutien.Par exemple, je vois New York comme un \u201cconvenient meeting center\u201d.La ville est habitée par des artistes qui viennent d\u2019ailleurs; donc, il faut bien regarder New York à deux niveaux.Il y a les artisans du village et toute une culture newyorkaise qui est extrêmement provinciale.Par contre, la ville est aussi un centre international et je crois que quand nous parlons de New York, c\u2019est parler de ce centre international qui fait vivre des artistes aussi à travers leurs expos à Dusseldorf et à Paris .Le rôle du réseau international de l\u2019art mérite une meilleure analyse que ce qui se fait maintenant dans les revues d\u2019art.Il y a tout un côté commérage à New York qui est confondu avec l\u2019histoire de l\u2019art.¦ Streetwork, dessins, xérox en couleurs Streetwork, dessins sur découpure de journal ch Centennial n nihilism nerging In rk to flat-space and subject.Malevitch ital scene t foot.He at work that drathe reali-ir.tlng of 20th-ceo-ases with n to the nequcnce is thereby the una-ject.itch lock* pare \"the When he , the ab-ectangles, ezes for Suprema- h's work it Is not rt matter as such; illustrate, deal doc-e switch, things or remat ism >ld green has seen al world, ora.The :o create, \"he latter ve; they of that >rematist \u2022» or.bet- .ho seem :tuel na-csurance, ., on the tich runs itradoxi-\u2022* theory ectly dt-¦nstruing itinerary is of left dynamic t, of ex-hese are tat were increasingly to take up Malevitch'* lime and energy after 1917.Yet these aspect* are external.They could be taken over by his disciples\u2014 and were\u2014without attaining what Is so evident in Malevitch'* art: the spiritual weight and the passion that lend it substance and depth.It is they that make the tiny pigment-covered rectangles \u2014 Malevitch\u2019* Suprematist canvases are smaller than his earlier ones \u2014feel boundless.Indeed.Malevitch has reactivated the mysterious relationship on which major art has been based since earliest times; A small visible surface becomes, through the labor of the hand, a vehicle for the infinite and the invisible.In paint, even rationality is made credible by the intervention of irrational factors.Malevitch knows this.\"In artistic creation.\" he noted, \"there must be a miracle.\" It is precisely the extreme contrast between medium and message that provokes the miracles.Without that small area of paint, the invisible depth of the imnd, the cosmic expanses of Male-vitch\u2019s universe simply do not exist: when congested into architectural models, i.e., deprived of the halo of pictorial space, his figures lose their pregnancy, turn utterly trite.In this respect Malevitch belongs to the period of Cnagall and Kandinsky rather than to that of Tallin or Rodchenko, with whom, from the end of World War I on, he was engaged in bitter polemics.To the Constructivists and the Productivists, Malevitch's sin was less the spiritualist aspects of his doctrine than the fact that he ultimately rested his case on that old miracle: paint's ability to say things that are not paint.\u2022 There is something trsgic about the disputes that agitated the Russian avant-garde of the 20's.For the fatal blow was to be dealt them by the only thing on which they agreed: the Revolution.Malevitch had welcomed It enthusiastically and woven .t into his system.Concern with \"subject matter,\" he asserted, is ''petty bourgeois.\" Hence, \"the way of modernity passes through Communism.'' Ten years later, the Soviet regime drew no distinctions; it crushed ail those who refused to express themselves through the language of Socialist Realism, which became the law in 1932 The final phase of Malevitch\u2019s career could only he poignant.In 1927 when he undertook his ill fated trip to Poland and Germany, fear had slready become his constant companion.Afraid of becoming suspect to the Soviet authorities.he abruptly returned to Moscow, leaving behind, in Berlin, the pictures thanks to which his achievement iji known to us.The rest is the now ah too familiar story of arTests, vexations, bans of teaching, publishing, exhibit's- He did continue to paint.But his work of the late years was worse than silence.For around 1930, he returned to f.gurative painting, with a hesitancy, a ghostliness m which one recognized only too well the stigmata of intimidation and despair.Tp survive, the geometric shapes of Suprematism now are forced to hide in the embroidery of the blouse worn by his wife in the weak Renaissance pastiche portrait ho painted of her in 1933.The recantation did not make him less suspect.He was imprisoned ipai* and released from jail only in lime ta die.at the age of 57.on May 15.193K Forty-three years later, the Soviet position on Malevitch appears to be unchanged.The state has acquired hundreds of his works, but one may ask oneself whether this has been done m order to forestall the risk of their being seen.Of the five works that tiie Rus-s.ans lent to the Paris exhibition, one was executed before Suprematism, the others after Malevitch had been bar* assed into giving it up.\t\u2022 f (1W«) by Kasitnir Malevitch Streetwork, 1978, Art Gallery of Ontario, Mars-Avril 1978, installation, dessins et construction en bois, 126\u2019 x 12\u2019 x 3\u2019 30 mm.st Pas fine encore \"'«stun GERHARD RICHTER * S aussi ?;;ntMire .%la 5 de soutien.garder Ne» Interview by Bruce Ferguson and Jeffrey Spalding View from Capri & Mt.Vesuvius, 1975, 70 x 100 cm, oil on canvas.v -ai* îxtr6mement un centre in-^sdeNew *Pds à Dus.mérite une 'tenant dans é'age à New it.| Gerhard Richter was born in Dresden, East Germany, in 1932.He Studied Fine Arts at the Academy of Schoonekunsten, Dresden, from 1952-57.His paintings have been widely and regularly exhibited in Europe and have been collected by a host of major museums.Currently, Richter is an instructor of painting at DusseldorfAcademy of Art, West Germany.He was interviewed by Bruce Ferguson and Jeffrey Spalding in Halifax, June, 1978.JS: Did you attend an art school?GR.: During my study I saw Western things, I visited Documenta in 1956 and was most impressed by Pollock and Fontana.This was a great new experience to see these things which we had not been allowed to see during the Nazis regime.JS.: From a North American standpoint your production encompasses some fairly disparate art-making modes: Impressionism, Photo-Realism, Minimalism, Reductivist Monochrome paintings and now lyrical colour field paintings.How can these be reconciled?GR.: Ya, before I started the photo-realist works I was at a deadpoint.I had been painting only grey paintings for two or three years.It was like I couldn\u2019t go further with them so I did completely the opposite, which shows the same feeling maybe.BF.: It seems also that you are allowing for a kind of complexity as opposed to a moral, religious point which would focus on one thing only.In North America there is definitely a belief that there is virtue in consistency.V GR: Ya, I studied Dutiful Arts, Fine Arts you say, for five years and earned a diploma from the Academy Schoonekunsten, in Dresden.It was a very academic, traditional school, where you learned to draw from plaster copies and nude models.I was disatisfied with this situation and with the prevailing art there; Social Realism.B.F.: After graduation what did you do?GR.: I was a free artist in Dresden, working on my paintings.From time to time I painted murals in buildings to earn my money.JS.: What was this early work like?GR.: Oh, somewhere between the realist painting we know from Russia, Impressionism and perhaps a bit of Picasso.JS.: I am surprised to hear that you were unhappy about the academic practices encouraged by the art school.I would have thought that your mature work, the portraiture and landscapes would have benifited from such an experience, or did you feel that you have had to invent new methods for your art?GR.: No, I was not satisfied at the time, but the training I received was a great influence upon me.The only new thing was to not be afraid to paint from a photo \u2014 it was not allowed.BF.: In the 50s, when you shifted from academic painting to the blurred portraiture, what was happening in Germany which might have inspired such an activity?GR.: There was a movement called Zero, in the Netherlands it was called Nulle \u2014 this was very successful in expanding the boundaries of art.And then Fluxus became successful; Fluxus was my point.I wanted to do these paintings which had nothing to do with art, for this I used to paint from photographs.BF.: Evidently, your actual working methods inspired, by your training have not changed, however, your intentions have.What would you say influenced this change?GR.: I think I have for all these different styles or methods, the same reason to do it but I can\u2019t explain it now.It\u2019s a fundamental reason .why to paint in such ways and this way and so.I think that every artist is capable to do any kind of style if he wants to do it.Ability is not the question.JS.: It\u2019s not just that you use different styles, in North America it is thought that art making springs from, or at least is guided by, a certain belief structure.Thus your personal temperament might steer you towards making monochrome paintings or perhaps to lyrical colour abstractions, but not both.These art-making attitudes seem to be mutually exclusive, antithetical: the mind-set necessary to accomodate one would preclude adoption of the other.For this reason a North American artist would be charged a diletante if he were to change camps as many times as you have.It\u2019s almost a matter of principle.How is it that you feel free from all our guilt complexes?GR.: I don\u2019t have these feelings because I know so many artists, some of them are my friends, and this was only a question to me at the beginning.BF.: Jackson Pollock for instance, would not have made your type of photo-realist painting because he believed in a philosophy which he had to realize a painting.JS.: .his re-introduction of the image into the drip paintings was interpreted by many as a sign of failure, that he had run dry, not that he had regenerated.BF.: .obviously, your philosophy encompasses all manners of painting.Why is that, what is that philosophy which encompasses those things?GR.: I can\u2019t believe in the reality of painting, so I use different styles like clothes to cover myself.BF.: By constantly switching back and forth you avoid the trap of becoming tied to a signature style and the kind of identity crisis which some artists go through when they reach a point in the development of their painting when they have achieved what they think is possible by working in a certain manner.Does your working method avoid that crisis?GR.: I would say that my behaviour is a little comparable to Picabia, wouldn\u2019t you?JS.: Well there are a number of artists who have \u201cflitted around\u201d, roaming all over the aesthetic map in an attempt to, as we say, \u201cfind themselves\u201d.Your actions seem to consciously involve these shifts in aesthetic position as a significant part of the content of the work.B.F.: When you exhibit, for example, a photo-realist work with an abstract work, is it important to you that they be seen at the same time?G.R.: It is irrelevant, it is more like an accident.BF.: You display a strong committment to art, but not to any particular style.GR.: No, not to a style of art.BF.: .so changing for you is merely another way of producing a content for art.GR.: Ya.JS.: This is of course what every student of art does, to go back to the art of the recent past which is personally relevant and to proceed from there.Many of your works are relatable to other artist\u2019s working methods, but is there something for you which is quintessential^ Gerhard Richter?GR.: No.JS.: Perhaps it is because of the one cloud painting in the National Gallery of Canada, but the photo-realist methodology seems like an anchor for your activities.Would this be a misconception?GR.: No, this would not be an error.I often use the word, pictures, to describe my work, which is a little unusual I think?JS.: It used to be that one would shrink away from the use of that term in the discussion of paintings.GR.: Ya, but I use the word because I don\u2019t make paintings.This is more a picture for me than a Photo: Garry Kibbins painting.A picture shows nothing, just a picture.This picture shows a landscape, the grey paintings are pictures from nothing.They have nothing to do with Bob Ryman\u2019s because his show something: the way it is painted, and an exploration of material qualities.BF.: So you choose to make works from snapshots or from your previous work?JS.: One of the large colour paintings at Sperone, Westwater, Fischer in New York, invokes a very convincing illusion of recession into space almost as if it were a misty landscape.What was the course for this work?GR.: Actually, it was a picture using one of my smaller abstract paintings as a source.BF.: A detail from one of the small studies?GR.: Ya, a detail of most of such a study from which I might paint three of more works.BF.: So these in effect are the still-lifes?GR.: Like still-lifes, ya.BF.: Why would you choose a painting as a still life as opposed to bottles or whatever else?Is that because of a belief that anything can be the content for art?GR.: That is one reason, but when I want to show a still-life I would make a photograph of it.I can\u2019t imagine an additional effect when you paint a still-life.I don\u2019t always believe in this, but generally.BF.: So in the beginning you always work from something which in itself is a translation of reality and then you re-translate it.GR.: Ya.BF.: And in the re-translation, does it become more real than the translation for you?GR.: It becomes more real because I know nothing about the real, reality.The only important thing for us is the translation.JS.: It\u2019s interesting to compare your method to the roughly contemporary Ian Burn photo-copy piece \u2014 one blank piece of paper xeroxed, xerox the xerox, and copy the copy and so on until the final page becomes a greyed image.Of course this is a neutered North American conception of the tautology in which the focus is upon the methodology whereas the outcome of this activity may tend towards blandness.O b-viously, your tautology investigating painting about painting, in the breakdown process leads to new beginnings, to something which is full of potential for visceral experience.Despite the minor current of humour and irony in your work there is a very straightforward positive air about it.Which is to say that many things are possible and not just that any kind of art is available to do, but everything has potential for significant achievement.G.R.: Ya, Ya.You say it wonderfully.BF.: He\u2019s not a questioner, he\u2019s an answerer.Were you interested or aware of Francis Bacon\u2019s work?GR.: A little bit, not much.JS.: Although the feeling and intensions are different there are some shared resemblances between his work and your earlier blurred portraits.GR.: Ya, but this kind of distortion in my work is more an accident than intention.JS.: Except many artist\u2019s aesthetic would not have permitted such an \u2018accident\u2019 from taking place, did his eccentricities provide any impetus or support for your own predilections, or were there other image painters whose work interested you at the time?GR.: No, I only remember, I wanted to do the opposite.I wanted to have nothing to do with Bacon and Zero and all these things.BF.: Many of your paintings seem to parody the image of German Expressionism, is this deliberate?GR.: I never thought about this.No, I can\u2019t say so.JS.: Your recent paintings make reference to the Abstract Expressionist work of Hans Hoffman.However, Abstract Expressionism implied a deep spiritual commitment, \u2018reaching into the inner soul for an outpouring\u2019.Instead you reach for a previous painting, make a photograph of it, blurr it, distort it.It\u2019s a different kind of procedure even though the results are similar.GR.: The way to come to the same result is different.more intellectual I think.what I am doing.BF.: In some ways you present a painting which has almost a false quality, the look of intensity, yet you deliberately detach yourself from that intensity by utilizing translation methods.GR.: I often try to paint without rules, beyond conventions.I was always surprised by and appreciated the contextual approach of American painting.This is the main difference I think.BF.: For instance, you might have allied yourself with Andy Warhol\u2019s silk-screen portraits?GR.: Ya, this is very true, he had great interest for me.BF.: So the subjective element is dismissed or repressed to some degree?Even though these works look like the product of subjective outpourings, as Jeff said, they in fact are very deliberate, cool and analytic.GR.: Ya, I believe so.BF.: Do you think the viewer is aware of this duality or irony?GR.: Maybe not.There is a problem right now with misinterpretation.So I will try the abstract paintings again to see if I can make it clearer, perhaps by showing the large paintings and the studies for them together.I hope to try this in September at an upcoming show in Einhoven, Netherlands.JS.: There is an interesting comparison between Roy Lichenstein\u2019s career and yours.GR.: Ah yes.JS.: He too feeds on past art as a source of content.Yet, his art re-does all styles over in his Ben Day dot technique.In your photo-realist Hoffmans, or remakes of minimalism or reductivist work you incorporate a wider range of techniques.GR.: Yes, however for me Linchenstein is too ironical.JS.: But he has an interest in shape and colour also, would you say that a major difference is your preoccupation with the tactility and surface of your paint application?G.R.: Ya, I would say so.BF.: Do you think that your painting calls into question the art style which it resembles or acts as a form of art criticism?GR.: I can\u2019t say yes.art criticism.I don\u2019t believe so.JS.: To me your activities seem to expand the possibilities available rather than act as a critique of art.GR.: In Venice there is an international exhibition with a theme: Reality and Abstraction, in two separate pavillions.I sent two identical large monochrome grey paintings and they put one in the Realist pavillion and one in the Abstract pavillion.(everyone laughter).and I agreed.BF.: Is there a formula of methodology which guides the production of the grey paintings?GR.: No nothing like that, I just try to get them to look the same.JS.: Obviously a part of your content is irony or humour, but what are you looking for in the creation of the individual specific objects?GR.: A kind of correctness.I don\u2019t know.JS.: Then the abstract paintings would be assessed in the terms of other abstract expressionist work?GR.: No nothing to do with it, more in line with Carl Andre I think.BF.: How do you know then when one of the abstract paintings in finished since you do not share the same formal concerns?GR.: When it looks finished.BF.: When it looks like an abstract expressionist painting?GR.: Never, it is finished when I don\u2019t have another idea or a reason to do more and when it is not completely wrong.JS.: An abstract painting is always more difficult to say is finished than a realist one \u2014 you could always add a splotch here or there or take one away.I am surprised that your working method involves so much subjective choice.It really is that intuitive?GR.: Ya.BF.: For a time the influence of American art was considerable in Europe, do you feel that this influence is on the wane?GR.: Ya, the time of reaction to American art is over.The new European artists are becoming more important.The recent Chicago exhibition did not show this because it showed artists who were already too well known.BF.: Do you feel European artists and even yourself are more politically inclined, or allude to political undercurrents in their work?GR.: Ya, in the past but this is mostly finished.J.S.: It appears as if in Europe there is inordinate interest in artists such as Judd, Morris, Flavin, Serra, and Andre.GR.: Ya.JS.: .Well in North America, at this point, it would be pretty difficult to drum up much enthusiasm for this work.Although fractured, attention has shifted to artists who have been investigating other concerns.From our vantage point, it appears as though Minimalism is still big news in Europe.GR.: Ya, this is true.It comes from the system.Museums have a budget and buy new pieces each year.They are looking for new art but they have no opportunities to see it.BF.: Your works are nowowned by two public galleries in Canada, the National Gallery, and the Winnipeg Art Gallery, and you have had your first one man show in New York.Was it important to you to enter the critical situation here?GR.: Ya, the show was my first step.It was not too successful but I will try again.The only thing that I thought was not too bad was that most of the people didn\u2019t understand the paintings, some of them liked them and 32 Ht*?* Msm& m&m.jf-tr >1 ' -v, jam ~-=r'ss 22LÏ-â3£ Z.mK *'-jT r» /;.rTf.BKwF.veiWfc 'ïrt - \\ CT^rS&m\" I.^ùt ~Uimmin*.:uï,-*Vs.-: .*-.-,-;y,-»-.;->¦ ¦.» \u2022 :V ¦ ' some of them hated them, but they really didn't understand.This is better than the reaction to the paintings in the Chicago show where I showed the colour cards and the grey paintings and all I noticed was that people said, \u201cAll we know is that we have the same monochrome paintings too\u201d.BF.: Who collects your work?GR.: Private patrons and museums, half and half.Maybe now more museums.B.F.: What do you see as the direction for your work now?GR.: It is my intention to continue to work from photographs from the small abstract paintings throught to the large colour abstractions.BF.: Are there upcoming exhibitions?G.R.: Nothing definite for North America.I have a show in London.?¦ Oil Sketch (without title), 1976, 65 x 60 cm, oil on canvas.Photo: Garry Kibbins Vue de l'exposition à la Winnipeg Art Gallery.Photo: Ernest Mayer.rM - \u2022., .Steranko: Graphie Narrative par Francine Périnet Steranko Graphie Narrative: Story Telling in the Comics and the Visual Novel, coordonnée par les conservateurs invités Philip Fry et Ted Poulos, Winnipeg Art Gallery, été 78.Un événement a eu lieu à la Winnipeg Art Gallery; en effet, une exposition consacrée entièrement à l\u2019étude de l\u2019oeuvre d\u2019un créateur de bandes dessinées: Steranko: Graphie Narrative a été montrée pendant l\u2019été de \u201978.La Winnipeg Art Gallery s\u2019était préparée à l\u2019événement en présentant en 1973 une exposition sur le médium bande dessinée qui s'articulait sur une analyse attentive des structures de composition de la b.d.L\u2019exposition de 1973: The Structure of Comics était importante sous plusieurs points de vue mais surtout, elle introduisait dans le circuit officiel de diffusion et de reconnaissance ce médium de la bande dessinée.Plus importante encore, l\u2019exposition Steranko: Graphie Narrative vient préciser le sens de la démarche adoptée lors de l\u2019introduction de ce médium dans le musée.Nous pourrions poser plusieurs hypothèses comme base de discussion de l\u2019exposition sur l\u2019oeuvre de Jim Steranko.Je retiendrai d\u2019abord une hypothèse de lecture globale de l\u2019événement/production/organisa-tion/présentation/intention.Cette lecture devra donc se faire de l\u2019extérieur.Je me place comme spectateur de l\u2019oeuvre, lecteur averti par le contexte de l\u2019exposition, par le catalogue, par le titre, mais aussi, et d\u2019une manière préconçue, par l\u2019organisation, la présentation de l\u2019oeuvre dans l\u2019espace-galerie articulée sur la lecture de l\u2019objet (à lire aussi comme objet politique).L\u2019importance de l\u2019exposition Steranko est à dénoncer d\u2019abord historiquement: c\u2019est la première fois que l\u2019oeuvre d\u2019un artiste de la bande dessinée est montrée et analysée comme objet de création et dans le cadre officiel d\u2019une exposition endossée par un musée.Il s\u2019agit en plus d\u2019une exposition solo, ce n\u2019est plus le regard d\u2019un musée sur un phénomène marginal d\u2019Art populaire, mais plutôt, par le choix de ce genre \u2014 détermination d\u2019une forme de présentation de l\u2019objet comme élément signifiant de l\u2019objet \u2014 de démonstration, le musée devient un élément déterminant dans la lecture idéologique de ce nouvel objet.Donc, ce nouvel objet: l\u2019exposition Steranko: Graphie Narrative, qui par son titre réoriente le sens de son impact, n\u2019est pas un jeu politique, intention juxtaposée à la bande dessinée de Jim Steranko, mais tout au contraire, une analyse de Yobjet bande dessinée qui replace le travail de création dans un rapport où sa structure de composition se réalise en structure ouverte, c\u2019est-à-dire où doit se lire le concept sous-jacent à l\u2019objet et ne se réalisant que par sa lecture.Le titre souligne le rapport de lecture faite de l\u2019oeuvre de Jim Steranko; l\u2019utilisation de l'expression \u201cGraphie Narrative\u201d fait référence à la spécificité des structures narratives utilisées pour construire le récit de la b.d.Cette remarque sur la spécificité des structures narratives du récit dans la bande dessinée comme principe énoncé dans le titre de l\u2019exposition nous conduit directement à l\u2019oeuvre de Steranko.Les oeuvres présentées à la Winnipeg Art Gallery peuvent être abordées par le biais de trois différentes options: les pages de bandes dessinées choisies et isolées dans l\u2019exposition, les recueils de bandes dessinées de Steranko rassemblés dans une section de l\u2019exposition, la salle de lecture, et enfin par le biais du catalogue accompagnant l\u2019exposition, partie intégrante de l\u2019exposition.Un point d\u2019articulation entre ces trois voies: la structure narrative sous son aspect graphique.L\u2019analyse de la structure s\u2019attarde surtout à l\u2019étude de fonctions spécifiques dans la composition du récit.Ainsi, on retrouve tant dans le catalogue que dans l\u2019organisation des espaces de l\u2019exposition, trois grandes sections qui construisent l\u2019espace conceptuel de la narration graphique de la b.d.: d\u2019abord étude du rôle du narrateur, étude des caractères, lieux et accessoires de récit et étude des composantes formelles de la narrativité.Pour compléter l\u2019exploration de l\u2019oeuvre de Steranko, une salle de lecture a été aménagée afin de permettre la réintégration des fragments du discours de l\u2019exposition dans leur propre contexte narratif.Le travail d\u2019analyse à propos de l\u2019oeuvre de Jim Steranko dégage de façon évidente le rapport implicite existant entre le narrateur et le lecteur.Le méta-language ainsi créé demande de la part du narrateur une définition précise du rôle qu\u2019il tient dans l\u2019élaboration du récit, rôle multiple et changeant selon les différents \u201cespaces-temps\u201d co-existant dans un même récit.La démonstration du travail de Steranko comme narrateur s\u2019appuie sur les composantes spécifiques de la b.d.Ainsi une étude systématique a été menée à partir des points d\u2019articulation du récit dans sa forme abstraite (structure) mais on a aussi étudié les moyens formels utilisés par Steranko comme signifiant graphique de récit.Steranko articule son récit à partir de données matérielles qui lui permettent de définir son rôle de narrateur.Ainsi, la page couverture, la page d\u2019introduction, la disposition du dialogue et du texte dans l\u2019image font face à une analyse très serrée de ses possibilités d\u2019utilisation comme signifiant de récit.L\u2019image traditionnelle se transforme, à chaque fois indice de sens, afin de remplir une fonction de récit.Les fonctions graphiques des composantes de l\u2019image ne sont pas toujours liées étroitement au déroulement logique du récit, elles sont par contre fort importantes en tant qu\u2019éléments structurant le type de lecture suggérée du narrateur au lecteur; ces images permettent aussi une lecture où sont souvent précisés les différents sens des éléments formels utilisés.Ainsi l\u2019image catalytique, l\u2019image-séquence, s\u2019ordonne dans le récit, non plus en termes de succession de temps différents (vignettes) mais par une mise en rapport sur un espace-page de son espace plat contredisant l\u2019espace perspectif de la mise en abîme du récit.En opposition à ce type d\u2019image, Steranko crée des effets spéciaux qui viennent s\u2019inscrire logiquement dans le récit, mais qui, en même temps, démontre le rôle important du narrateur dans la détermination du genre de récit.L\u2019image ainsi fabriquée impose son mode de lecture et ouvre un champ de signification dépassant largement les cadres de l\u2019action.(Fig.1 et 2).L\u2019artiste de bandes dessinées doit, pour le lecteur, rendre compte de l\u2019espace-temps du récit.Pour remplir ces conditions, une analyse de la représentation des personnages, lieux et accessoires qui composent le récit est nécessaire.Les caractères, lieux et accessoires conçus dans la b.d.de Steranko sont pour la plupart basés sur une dialectique manichéenne.Par contre, Steranko semble suggérer chez ses personnages une certaine ambiguité qui par son intégration dans la problématique de la narrativité visuelle nous replace devant le couple: apparence/réalité.Comme la photographie, comme la peinture, comme le film, la bande dessinée met en oeuvre des éléments de composition qui sont aussi perçus comme des éléments signifiants \u2014 codés \u2014 qui participent à la mise en signification de l\u2019image.Dans l\u2019oeuvre de Steranko, les différentes techniques utilisées pour réaliser la mise en séquence du récit en images constituent une partie importante pour la production d\u2019une narration figurative.Nous verrons comment Steranko, par l\u2019intermédiaire d\u2019un travail original de l\u2019espace-page, se sert d\u2019éléments comme le cadrage, la composition, la profondeur, les différents angles et prises de vue, les jeux de lumière et de couleurs et la mise en page, pour faire participer le spectateur à la narration.Nous prendrons comme exemple une page tirée des aventures du Captain America, représentant Madame Hydra, personnage cumulant les forces du mal.Vêtue de noir, ses cheveux sont noirs et cachent en tombant sur son visage, une cicatrice, souvenir des guerres d\u2019Europe.(Fig.3) La lecture de la séquence se fait normalement de gauche à droite et de haut en bas; mais là s\u2019arrête le rapport aux codes traditionnels de la mise en page.Je ferai ici une description point par point du travail de Steranko afin de mettre en évidence le rapport des composantes formelles à la mise en récit.PREMIÈRE BANDE \u2022\tUne seule vignette qui occupe un peu moins de la moitié supérieure de la page.\u2022\tUtilisation de la contre-plongée.\u2022\tTravail de mise en profondeur de l\u2019espace de la 34 \\> \\', \\ \\ V Û vs».- *\u2022* /^d/ (tr, fy*4 ?/HU/ \u2014I 0 U) CO fwr ¦ ¦ co -c UL O O) 03 gauche vers la droite dans le sens de la lecture du récit.\u2022\tUtilisation d\u2019un personnage chevauchant l\u2019espace iconique et l\u2019espace diégétique réaffirmant la profondeur de l\u2019espace sur la droite de la vignette.\u2022\tImportance du gestuel dans l\u2019image pour la mise en séquence du récit: le fulsil-mitrailleur lie le texte \u2014 espace de la diégèse \u2014 à l\u2019\u201cinsert\u201d, (vignette inscrite dans la vignette-maîtresse), souligne un temps spécifique dans l\u2019espace-temps de l\u2019introduction de la séquence et lie étroitement l\u2019espace en profondeur de la vignette à l\u2019espace-page, le tabulaire.Notez ici que l\u2019\u201cinsert\u201d déborde sur la bande centrale.BANDE CENTRALE \u2022\tVariation des formats desdifférentesvignettes.\u2022\tPremière vignette: disparition du cadre de l\u2019image, occupation de la moitié de la surface de la bande.\u2022\tVignettes 2S-4-5-6: gros plans sur Madame Hydra, image-miroir.La première image, en éliminant le cadre, amène le spectateur à une lecture simultanée de l\u2019espace réel de la page et de l\u2019espace-illusion de la représentation.Dans le vignette, cette même dualité est entretenue par la représentation de Madame Hydra et de son reflet dans le miroir; ou encore par la représentation du miroir comme élément creusant l\u2019espace, l\u2019illusion de l\u2019illusion.La disparition du cadre est aussi un indice de changement de point de vue dans la continuité du récit.La deuxième moitié de la bande centrale se subdivise en 5 vignettes, gros plans de Madame Hydra, mais est aussi compression du temps de l\u2019histoire pour le lecteur.La fragmentation de l\u2019espace réaffirme la vraisemblance du personnage et de son histoire.La mise en place de ce \u201ctracking\u201d impose au spectateur une lecture subjective du récit.Ainsi le spectateur se voit dans l\u2019obligation de varier ses points de vue, donc de changer sa lecture; le lecteur lit l\u2019image-reflet en se déplaçant derrière le personnage réel de Madame Hydra afin de s\u2019y substituer au moment, où dans la bande du bas, elle brise son reflet.L\u2019illusion est brisée, la surface du miroir se confond avec la page de la b.d., le cadre a disparu de nouveau; Madame Hydra se confond à l\u2019espace réel du spectateur et est alors écrasée par la réalité même de son personnage.Ce glissement dans l\u2019espace du spectateur est alors réaffirmé par l\u2019utilisation de la plongée qui repousse Madame Hydra à l\u2019avant de la page.Cette lecture de substitution, lecture du tabulaire, s\u2019articule autour de deux points de transition: I insert dans le passage de l\u2019image d\u2019introduction au développement de la séquence et le chevauchement du personnage réel de la bande centrale, soit Madame Hydra, mais en même temps reflet brisé de la bande finale.Cette dialectique reflète le lieu principal du discours de Steranko entre la réalité et l\u2019apparence dans la narration.L\u2019ensemble de l\u2019oeuvre de Steranko, le catalogue et l\u2019exposition sont un exemple de travail sur I objet et son discours; démonstration nécessaire d\u2019une pensée conceptuelle propre à l\u2019objet.Il est regrettable que cette exposition ne soit montrée que dans les petites galeries de province.Ce fait dénonce d\u2019ailleurs comment l\u2019institution occulte la puissance narrative de l\u2019image.¦ Fig.Ill Captain America, No.113, page 4.Copyright® by Marvel Comics Group.All rights reserved.mm 04*0# S TRoCK ER BU T W£l/ER CAN T ESCAPE THF T yPANN-* or -aay AH/R RO R/ « -WHEN, AT T HE TOUCH or a 3 u t-row-\" EC/W1//VAT30 THOSE Of W/GWEST hvdra rank (SO THAT r, IN THIS SECTOR.I WOULD THEM BECOME -SUPREME WYRRA.roe vears, STRUGGLED rOR MERE SuEr'/f'AL- LI VING H/tTS AS BEST I could/ WITH none to GU/PE vtE-WlTH NONE TO CARE/ I DRIFTED INTO A life or CR/ME-CL/LAAI-NATlNG WITH THE DEATH 35 Mia Westerlund\u2019s Pictorial Sculpture by Peter White Untitled, 1975, 64\u201d x 36\u201d, oil pastel on paper.For 11 years Mia Westerlund has been making sculpture which persistently states a common theme.Whatever form her work has taken, it has presented the viewer with the fact of a calm, steadying tonic in which the fluctuations and complexities of the sculpture \u2014 perhaps symbolically life itself \u2014 are grounded and resolved.Writing in 1973 about the fiberglass sculpture she was then making, John Chandler described her sensibility as having something of the wisdom of the East.1 In the sensuous, tactile, vaguely erotic forms, he found as an organizing principle the integration of polarities: hard/soft, warm/cool, geometric/organic, order/disorder.In this touchstone unity of opposites there is in Westerlund\u2019s sculpture, something quixotic, unaffected, sobering, romantic and compellingly optimistic.In a world that splits the timeless equation of mind and body, hers is a notion of tranquil stability and permanence.Shaping the character of her art, it animates her least effective forms and invests her best work with real and significant meaning.The formal point of departure of her work has been the idea of making sculpture based on pictorial imagery, that is on images conceived two-dimensionally.To date, there have been three distinct phases.In the first, she casts soft materials with polyester resin and sets down the outlines of her interests.Five years ago she switched to concrete, another material that begins soft and winds up hard.The change was prompted by certain similarities with id the style of the late American expressionist sculptor | Eva Hesse and because it had become physically dif-jS\tficult and unpleasant to work\twith the toxic resins.In 1\tthe second phase, she made\ta series of slabs, fol- S\tlowed by a series of standing\twedge pieces which, in \u201d\teffect, lift up the slabs.In the\tthird phase, a group of i\u2014\tcast concrete volumes made last winter, she has come 2\tto terms with formal problems involved in making pic-£ torial sculpture for the first time since she began using mm\\ iK MfJS lit ¦\t1 Untitled (5 part), 1972, 36\u201d diameter (each part), mixed media.concrete.Clear and penetrating, as if she had concentrated her vital thoughts and feelings in sculptural equivalents of the Leibniz monad, the basic unit of life, they provide the most direct revelation of her synthesizing sensibility yet.The association with Hesse is unfortunate.Though Westerlund has said that she felt she had \u201c.totally been inside her head\u201d2 after seeing Hesse\u2019s work for the first time at the 1972 Guggenheim retrospective, their fiberglass sculpture nevertheless is fundamentally different.Pictorial sculpture, the use of fiberglass and several compositional ideas are points of contact for two artists coming from different places and headed in different directions.In attempting to establish the setting of Westerlund\u2019s concrete sculpture in which these differences are more evident, I am going to make what may seem a rather involved comparison of her\u2019s and Hesse\u2019s fiberglass sculpture.I believe the comparison will isolate the indépendance of Westerlund\u2019s position within a range of shared values.At the same time, it will provide an index of her esthetic interests which, though they have of necessity been adjusted, have remained more or less the same since the switch to concrete.Hesse\u2019s sculpture might be described as the materialization of a complex, contradictory personality in search of self-definition.In Westerlund\u2019s sculpture, however, one does not find the artist as existential confessor, purveying her own condition as an act of projecting it in the world.Though nodding in the direction, Westerlund never engaged in Hesse\u2019s obsessive, ranging excursions nor approached her paradoxical and often macabre destinations.Westerlund\u2019s work is expressive of personnality but in the sense that it evokes a gentle, life-embracing spirit.The French phenomenologist Gaston Bachelard\u2019s characterization of the poetic image moving from a preconscious source and perceived as \"reverberation\u201d seems apt.Transformation, or process, is the principle both Hesse and Westerlund used to turn sort materials into art.However, Hesse was not so deeply involved with process as Westerlund.Hesse\u2019s intentions being expressionist, transformation was only an intermediary agent of her more profound need.Westerlund, on the other hand, has said her system, or process, was to allow the material to do \"80 per cent of the work.\u201d Accidents of process determined the final form.She is as interested in bringing something new into the world as she is in what she can say with it.Process is a way to discover what she actually does feel, what the philosopher Ernst Cassirer called the artist\u2019s \u201cdiscovery of reality.\u201d If, for example, Hesse integrated ugliness and beauty to convey absurdity, Westerlund only happened to integrate them, though the fact they form a stable unity in her work is not accidental.Paradoxically, though Westerlund\u2019s materials are of such importance to her \u2014 since the activity of making was the major focus of her art \u2014 her identification with them, that is the feeling in the finished object of the artist\u2019s actual bodily presence, is less pronounced that in Hesse\u2019s sculpture.In this depersonalization or objec- 36 tification, Westerlund\u2019s work is significantly cooler than Hesse\u2019s.Both artists incorporated serial of modular frames of reference.But whereas Hesse used them as a principle of order against which her irrational and eccentric intentions would play to greater effect \u2014 the distortion of like elements and the repetition of them until all seems vertiginous and absurd \u2014 Westerlund used the module as a positive value in itself.The parts of Truncated-4 Parts, 1972, for instance, could be arranged in any number of configurations.In this context, Westerlund stands somewhere between the controlled anti-form of Hesse and Minimalism.Rather than transforming the order of her modules with expressionist distortions, Westerlund makes her point by undermining order with slight imperfections and close but not identical values.The combination of polyester resin with other materials produces an organic, tactile quality.It was by pushing this effect hard that Hesse discovered the very powerful erotic and unsettling potential inherent in the process.Westerlund did not push so hard.In her work the physical qualities of the fabric, not only the synthetic, were stressed.The surfaces of her sculptures are delicate, even when, for instance, a rough hemp was used.Her eroticism is becalmed potential.The work is evocative, elegant, often muscular but never ugly or difficult to stomach.Where Hesse sought the visceral statement, Westerlund\u2019s objective was modest and subtle, \u201cto make them lively\u201d.Historically, Hesse\u2019s links are made with the Pollock side of Abstract Expressionism, with Oldenburg and Surrealism of the nightmarish sort.Going back further, her roots can be found in German Expressionism.Westerlund\u2019s kindred spirits woujd seem to be Newman and Rothko and Miro of the \u201ccarnival\u201d forms.More broadly, her work can be placed in what art historian Robert Rosenblum has identified in modern painting as a transcendentalizing \u201cNorthern Romantic Tradition,\u201d in which feelings are cool, deep and expansive rather than hot, immediate and pointed.A native of New York, Westerlund had an art education but did not make sculpture seriously until 1968, several years after she had finished school.At this time, she was living in Toronto but had contact in New York with Lynda Benglis and Alan Saret, artists who, along with Hesse and others, were central figures in the reaction against Minimalism then under way.The pictorial orientation of Westerlund\u2019s art and her use of soft materials, the signal trait of these artists, were as a result of their influence.However, whereas Benglis and Saret were acting on esthetic convictions resulting from their evolution as artists, for Westerlund the style came, so to speak, as a ready-made.This is illustrated by a series of \u201cpulse\u201d drawings made in 1972 in which runs of vertical lines, neither straight nor wavy, occasionally overlapping, generate rhythms and counter-rhythms pulsing back and forth across the picture plane.Pace is derived as well from the varying density, weight and thickness of the lines.These drawings activate artistic intention at a level not matched by the fiberglass sculpture: the two-dimensional imagery she has in mind is more focused in two dimensions than three.Indeed, the flat, non-illusionistic drawings made to accompany her concrete sculpture often have been preferred by viewers.The point is not that the sculpture failed but that evolution of some sort seems to have been necessary for Westerlund to deal with the very complex question of the relationship of the pictorial and sculptural ideas with which she had got herself involved.Looked at this way, the decision to change to a material she could call her own was of critical importance.It would force her to confront what she was doing and what exactly it was she wanted to do.The development of artistic self-consciousness \u2014 the inevitable coming to terms with modernism for an artist whose starting point was strongly aligned with the traditional approach of craft \u2014 thus becomes a leitmotif of her sculpture as it evolves.In their congruence of image and object, the fiberglass pieces have an intellectual kind of beauty or poetry.In this sense, they were indebted to Jasper Johns whose flags and targets made the depicted contour and the actual contour of the object identical.In Johns\u2019 insight there were fortuitous implications for the object\u2019s presence and identity as three-dimensional form, which is to say, as (potential) sculpture.This possibility was grasped by Westerlund.Although the pictorial imagery of Westerlund\u2019s fiberglass sculpture is never as direct or clear as in the pulse drawings, the imagery nevertheless was transcribed into whatisune-quivocally sculpture.This immanent sculptural quality is more pronounced in Westerlund than in many others involved in pictorial sculpture.For one thing, Westerlund was never a constructivist.None of her sculpture has involved tacking things together, binding, covering, joining etc.She prefers closed volumetric shapes to flat, optical images.Even though her first work began as relief or depended upon placement in relation to a wall to be read as a picture, it is evident in her strongest fiberglass pieces, in particular such later ones as Rising and Airflow-Closed, both 1972, that her natural feeling is for sculpture.These pieces are floorbound objects, fully exposed in the round.They occupy space, indicate what mass and weight they have and invite contemplation equally and inseparably as sculpture and pictorial images.Taking Johns a step further, into full sculptural volume, Westerlund reveals her conservatism, a strong attachment to the traditional forms of art history.Such complete absorption of pictorial imagery in three-dimensional form is doubly signifiant.It relates to the slabs and wedges, where their association becomes problematic, and metaphorically, their union constitutes an absolute in the massing of opposites.Indeed, it is here, where the informal impulses of her art and its formal manifestations meet, that the source of the deep and constant strength of her sculpture can be divined.When this union is missing, or incomplete, her work is not quite the same.From the vantage point of her most recent sculpture it is possible to look back and see her work in concrete as an attempt to transfer this essential ingredient to the new material.When she first experimented with concrete, Westerlund hoped she would be able to carry over the organic and tensile qualities of her fiberglass sculpture.Further, she hoped to obtain them by applying the process concepts, or variations on them, with which she had been so successful previously.This proved impossible because concrete lacks the flexibility of polyester resin \u2014 thus blunting Westerlund\u2019s desire to let the material do the work.In an attempt to resolve the problem, she made the slabs, responses to the flat, planar forms concrete tends to take in the world of useful objects \u2014 sidewalks and roads.Thin forms which rest on the floor, the slabs are composed of either a single concrete square (like a sidewalk paving stone) or two, four-foot square panels brought together to form a rectangle (like a section of road).In some of the road pieces one of the panels is covered with asphalt, a material also associated with road surfaces.A serious practical problem of the slabs is their location.Because they lie on the floor, it is difficult for the viewer to see what is going on on the surface, the area at this time of Westerlund\u2019s prime concern.By lifting the slabs up off the ground, the wedges eliminate viewing problems.Compositionally they are more sophisticated than the slabs.Each consists of two wedges placed side-by-side so as to leave a Newman-like \u201czip\u201d in between.Large rectangular steel plates, which, as a result of oxidization, become ethereal fields of rust, are set in the surfaces of some wedges.On the surfaces of others,delicate,soft gestures have been made with a trowel, suggesting the creaminess and the sensuousness of the concrete when it was still wet.These areas are framed by a contrasting border created by treating the concrete along the edges of the wedge faces with a dark pigment.These borders Minoan Series, 1978, 22\u201d x 11\u201d x 17\u201d, concrete/copper mu Minoan Series, 1978.23V4'' x 22\u201d x 13'/2\u201d, concrete/copper.wMmMwSmMA : P- ÆMh.Minoan Series, 1978, 24\u201d x 21 \u201d x 15\", concrete/copper l'ifSlli Minoan Series, 1978, 23\u201d x 21 \u201d x 11 \u201d, concrete/copper 37 \u201cframe\u201d the surfaces, thus analogizing the sculptures with paintings.The slabs and wedges reflect a strong feeling for the materials involved.They continue the fiberglass sculpture\u2019s dialectical play of opposites and yield a similar equanimity.Nevertheless, they lack the impact of the best fiberglass sculpture.This is because there has been a subtle but fundamental shift of premises.Rather than pictorial images embodied in sculpture, the slabs and wedges are concerned with the pursuit of painterly ideas through sculpture.Essentially, they are field paintings, emphasizing surface, with a I\u2019art brut feeling because they have been made of concrete.Sculpture has become a container for painting.The resulting forms, thin and lacking volume, erode the sculptural foundation that is the source, to my mind, of the impact of her most convincing work.Another effect of this shift is the introduction of a personal element not evident in the fiberglass pieces.In the slabs and wedges, concrete is conceived as paint as well as a structural material.Marks made in the concrete act as gesture so that the work lacks the emotional distance that established the distinctively «cool» mood of the fiberglass sculpture.The changed premise of the slabs and wedges introduces problems not encountered in the fiberglass sculpture.Because they are oriented to painting rather than sculpture there is an onus on the artist that her gesture be fresh and original.In this sense the slabs and wedges do not always succeed.This is not because Westerlund draws badly but because concrete is not an especially responsive medium for drawing.Allowing materials to process themselves, an idea carried over from fiberglass, is not so appropriate with concrete.Drawings accompanying the sculpture, with rich, waxy surfaces of pastel and oil stick which have been scored, scratched and drawn into are closer to the surface sensuousness Westerlund has in mind.The concrete surfaces seem rather inert and uncommunicative by comparison.There are also the shapes of the slabs and wedges themselves to be considered.Each is something known in the mind before they were made.This does not sit easily with Westerlund\u2019s interest in bringing something new into the world, with all that can mean for what she has to say.At the simplest level, the familiarity of the forms has created false associations.The slabs have been interpreted as realist, urban sculpture, the wedges as Stonehenge figures with religious implications.A more critical issue involved with the shapes is control.By using these \u201cgiven\u201d forms, Westerlund has accepted what the material does naturally.With fiberglass, this strategy worked splendidly.Liquid polyester resin bends to the artist\u2019s will.Concrete is not so malleable.By allowing it these forms, Westerlund in effect allowed the material to impose structure.As suggested, these structures do not serve her interests well.There is a theory that the modern artist, when his or her art has become too complex, too elaborate or civilized, yearns for a return to something that is simple and not imperfect.3 Westerlund\u2019s most recent work, in particular three notched blocks seen at the Sable-Castelli Gallery in Toronto last May,4 fits this notion.They are simple shapes as opposed to involved formal arrangements and they are masses, emphasizing volume and weight, as opposed to flattened, rectangular and frontal forms.What is not imperfect about them, then, is that they are sculpture.The sculptures are trapezoidal with the top plane sloping gently upward to the viewer\u2019s thigh level.They have an inelegant, strong primitive feeling conveyed by rough-textured concrete surfaces and irregular, slightly drunk symmetries of what are nominally geometric shapes.A V-shaped notch runs top to bottom in one of the sides (sometimes an inversion of the corner) creating a negative space in the mass and an indentation at a point on the edge of the top plane.The notch itself is lined with copper which has been treated with acid.The chalky green patina left behind contrasts with the concrete mass into which black pigment has been mixed.Forms of her own imagination, the sculptures owe nothing to known shapes, though they have the squatness, as it happens, of Minoan columns.Westerlund has effectively made sculptural presence emphatic in these pieces.Partly, this is due to the manipulation of scale.The viewer is compelled to look down upon the top plane where attention is focused on the indentation.With the indentation functioning like the sight of a gun, the viewer moves around the sculpture and discovers a shifting perspective relationship between the top plane and the notch.Encouraging the viewer to examine all aspects of the sculpture, this relationship establishes the work as fully 360-degree sculpture.A different sculptural effect is obtained by the use of a 1/4-inch plywood mold.When the heavy, wet concrete is poured in, the plywood gives enough that the concrete can, in a sense, express its weight.In the finished work, an entasis effect combines with small scale to make the sculpture especially heavy, solid and stable.To say these pieces just sit there is to pay them a compliment.Supplementary to these sculptural effects is the use of the pigment, which both roughens up the exterior and produces a non-reflecting surface strong enough to prevent distraction from the object itself.As well, imaginary lines of projection \u2014 resulting from the sharp articulations of the corners and planes \u2014 extend to walls of the room in which the sculpture sits, thus pinpointing the location of the sculpture within the room.This reinforces the blocks\u2019 sense of stability as sculptural objects.Although the austerity of these blocks might suggest a Minimalist sensibility, a more valid comparison is the reductivism of Brancusi.Like Brancusi\u2019s, Westerlund\u2019s blocks are concerned with mass, volume and surface.Like Brancusi\u2019s, the sculpture provides its own contexts for its meanings \u2014 the notch analogous to the faint contour of a nose on the surface of an otherwise perfect ovoid shape.Whereas Brancusi abstracts from the human figure, however, Westerlund\u2019s point of departure is reductivist painting, specifically the all-over pictorial imagery of a Newman or Mondrian.Formally,the sculpture might be thought of as both the image of a figure-ground painting in three dimensions and a working figure-ground composition in which the black concrete mass acts as a textured, monochromatic ground, the patina as the figure.The important thing is that Westerlund, for the first time, has accomplished in concrete what she previously did in fiberglass: incorporate pictorial images in sculpture.With the assertion of sculpture, the problems relating to painting in the slabs and wedges'have simply disappeared.The most basic technical consideration in making concrete volumes is that they are cast.The most basic theoretical consideration in casting is that it involves artistic choice and decision-making.What form the sculpture will take and what meanings it will have is determined when the artist constructs a mold.In the slabs and wedges, casting was not significant since the shapes cast played only a supporting role.Meaning is conveyed by gesture as it is captured in drying concrete that is acting as a painterly surface.Meaning in the blocks, however, is a function of shape.It is in the interplay of the notch, scale, weight and asymmetry that Westerlund\u2019s meanings can be found.The key is that the sculpture enters the world fully made, a conceptual whole.With the blocks, Westerlund\u2019s general meanings, involving synthesis and self-discovery, emerge complete as they were thought out.Here they differ even from the fiberglass pieces where the process of making yielded meaning.Rather than determinations of process, the blocks are calculations based on esthetic decisions.With this response to the material, Westerlund as an artist has come to terms with the necessity \u2014 imposed on her sculpture by the use of concrete \u2014 of dealing with modernist self-awareness.The importance of this step can be seen in the directness with which the blocks speak.For crispness of expression and sense of conviction (with the exception of some drawings), there has been nothing like them in her oeuvre.Interpretations of such highly abstract art as Westerlund\u2019s are risky even when the artist offers assistance.In the case of Westerlund-wno does not talk much about her work or intentions, interpretation based simply on the phenomenological evidence seems riskier still.However, since everything known about Westerlund indicates that her attitude \u2014 in spite of the inevitable concerns with form \u2014 is, at heart, aformal, and because the notch and its relation to the mass from which it is cut make these pieces so specific and assertive, a couple of interpretations which go beyond her general sythesizing scheme seem worth making.The more obvious possibility is erotic.Not unlike Brancusi\u2019s Torso of a Young Man, which has no genitalia but which is itself a phallic shape, the blocks, with their deep negative space, seem to depict with a surprising literalness, a vaginal image.What was latent in the fiberglass pieces is here made explicit.The other idea is drawn from Bachelard\u2019s dialectic of inside and outside5 and mounts to an elaboration of Westerlund\u2019s pursuit of a reconciliation of opposites in a unified form.Bachelard describes a \u201csurface of being\u201d as a \u201cregion where being wants to be both visible and hidden.\u201d In Westerlund\u2019s blocks, the surface of such a dialectic is the copper lining.It marks the penetration of the space of the black mass but also blunts \u2014 because it covers \u2014 full exposure of the space.Forming a give-and-take relationship, the figure and ground of the blocks seem to shift and oscillate between the copper lining and the concrete mass, one assuming the foreground, then the other.We might therefore concur with Bachelard that \u201c.the movements of opening and closing are so numerous, so frequently inverted, and so charged with hesitation, that we could conclude on the following formula: man is a half-open being.\u201d7 The value of volumetric sculpture is revealed.Unlike a painting, where space must remain illusory, the space in these \u201cpictorial\u201d sculptures is real.A dimension which both clarifies and is rich with suggestive possibilities is added to the poetry of the pictorial image.The sculptures are resolved, self-contained structures potent with the high and beautiful quality of Westerlund\u2019s harmonizing sensibility.¦ FOOTNOTES 1.\tJohn Noel Chandler, \u201cThe Search for new forms: Mia Westerlund sculpture and drawings,\u201d Artscanada, February/March 1973, pp.43-47.2.\tThis and other comments of the artist were made in conversation with the author.3.\tRobert Goldwater, Primitivism in Modern Art, New York, 1967.4.\tThe series of concrete blocks also includes several columns and V-shaped blocks.They are not discussed because they do not seem to work nearly as well as the pieces that have been examined.5.\tGaston Bachelard, The poetics of Space, Boston, 1969, p.222.6.\tIbid.38 Miipr Wm,m SÏSSÏ USA '¦**x**y* \\ ^ >» ¦W!1\u2019 %.3'% ¦njjsi3 ***£> 5 SS6\tI «îlïi, mut toi :or,n®(e à toute 3ai|es#3etif2ile 5l3!eque lenom ?de 1973 (tron- i petit conital gfeetCW 'tfees: (Étapes) isielpwB MeUM r: ^ i exposp ; des Beaux-Arts \u201cIl y a d\u2019abord la ressemblance entre un site et les galeries d\u2019exposition: on y rencontre des objets actuels présentés comme une espèce de manifestation en surface, et des oeuvres plus anciennes, reliquats du passé, qui constituent les couches plus profondes.Il existe cependant une différence importante: les objets qui constituent le monument archéologique sont, pour la plupart, reliés intrinsèquement au lieu géographique qu\u2019ils marquent, segmentent et articulent.Les oeuvres faisant partie de îexposition-monument n\u2019ont pas de relation intrinsèque avec l\u2019endroit où le spectateur les trouve.Provenant de divers endroits, elles ont été choisies et réunies en fonction de l\u2019unité de l\u2019artiste en tant que producteur plutôt que de l\u2019unité du site.\u201d Philip Fry, catalogue de l\u2019exposition, p.28 \u201cLa \u201ccomparabilité\u201d n\u2019implique pas que l\u2019artiste ait été conscient de la relation entre son oeuvre et le matériel comparatif, et elle n\u2019entraîne pas non plus la mise en place d\u2019une dépendance artificielle.Elle se fonde sur le fait évident que des oeuvres de diverses époques et de divers lieux coexistent dans le monde.Le chroniqueur d\u2019art et le spectateur, lorsqu\u2019ils essaient de traiter l\u2019oeuvre qu\u2019ils ont en face d\u2019eux, peuvent avoir recours à ces autres oeuvres pour aider leur compréhension et leur appréciation.La comparaison de structures a trait à la réception d\u2019une oeuvre plutôt qu\u2019à sa construction.\u201d op.cit., p.30 \u201cAussi déconcertant que cela paraisse à première vue au spectateur, il y aura quelque chose de rassurant pour lui dans l\u2019idée que le monde lui-même, observé dans sa réalité littérale, n\u2019est qu\u2019un amalgame comparable d\u2019éléments hétérogènes: le point de vue du spectateur, les phénomènes de causalité, le hasard, interviennent dans la trame temporelle, unissant une multiplicité de choses au sein d\u2019un champ visuel unique.La structure de ce champ est le simple produit de ce qui se trouve être là.\u201d op.cit., p.72 \u201cIl va sans dire qu\u2019une histoire de l\u2019utilisation du rapport analogique entre le tableau et la fenêtre doit traiter de la présentation d\u2019une fenêtre, d\u2019une porte, du miroir ou du tableau à l\u2019intérieur de l\u2019espace pictural d\u2019un tableau, c\u2019est-à-dire du thème d\u2019un espace encadré à l\u2019intérieur d\u2019un autre espace encadré.Cette technique figurative engendre une sorte de système de proportion: l\u2019espace pictural considéré dans sa totalité est au monde dans lequel le spectateur est situé, ce que l\u2019espace vu par la fenêtre, le miroir ou le tableau inclus dans l\u2019image est à l\u2019espace pictural.Le spectateur est impliqué dans le passage d\u2019un type d\u2019espace à un autre, du littéral au figuratif et à la possibilité de réfléchir sur les relations entre ces deux ordres d\u2019espace.Si l\u2019espace littéral du spectateur est \u201créel\u201d, quelle est la réalité propre à l\u2019espace figuratif?\u201d op.cit., p.82 \u201cMon oeuvre porte sur une dimension de la vie et de l\u2019art: sur le fait qu\u2019il y a autre chose que ce qui apparaît et que c\u2019est beaucoup plus grand que ce qui paraît être; que la vie, ce que nous concevons être la vie, notre existence ici, le fait que nous soyons là, n\u2019est qu\u2019une infime partie d\u2019un tout.quel que soit ce tout.\u201d Charles Gagnon, op.cit., p.84 \u201cIl en résulte que l\u2019espace semble se déplacer, s\u2019ouvrir et se reconstruire à mesure que l\u2019oeil établit des points de repère.Les contours délimitent un espace ambigu qui se transforme à mesure que l\u2019attention se transporte d\u2019une zone vers une autre.\u201d op.cit., p.86 , : WÊÊÉ: \u2022 ! \u201cMes tableaux ressemblent beaucoup à des écrans de cinéma par leur forme et les bandes noires qui les délimitent.Il m\u2019est aussi apparu évident que ce qui se passait à l\u2019extérieur de l\u2019écran était, d\u2019une certaine façon, aussi important que ce qui se passait sur l\u2019écran.\u201d Charles Gagnon, op.cit., p.92 \u201cL\u2019oeuvre de Gagnon conduit à la communion, plus qu\u2019à la communication, parce qu\u2019elle offre une forme de contenu \u2014 une fenêtre, une porte, un seuil \u2014 qui s\u2019ouvre vers un espace d\u2019une nature différente, et elle engage le spectateur à donner une partie de sa propre personne comme substance du contenu.Gagnon nous offre la frontière de l\u2019ouvert.\u201d op.cit., p.116 3) COMMENTAIRE SONORE Lee Konitz (a.s.) Windows, Steeplechase SCS-1057 \u2014 Duo avec Hal Galper (p.) \u201cThese \u2019\u2019Windows\u201d, then, don\u2019t merely provide an outward view; they afford an opportunity for inward examination, too.And a peek over this particular sill presents a tableau of absorbing and effortless lyricism.\u201d Chris Sheridan, notes de pochette.RAYMOND GERVAIS ' ¦ - \u2018 £ ; x \\ m m HtiSi S?; .\tv\t¦ > :/ Photo no 8 Photo no 14 Photo no 12 Photo no 16 55 information livres et revues MONOGRAPHIES ET OUVRAGES THÉORIQUES DIVERS Coppet, Daniel de, Zemp H., \u2018Aré\u2019 aré (un peuple mélanésien et sa musique), Paris, Seuil, 1978, 127 p.ill.Un ethnologue et un ethnomusicologue se sont réunis pour nous présenter dans ce livre, en accord avec ceux dont il fait le portrait, un peuple mélanésien à travers sa musique.L\u2019étrange impression, le dépaysement que créent ce livre et le disque qu\u2019il contient vaut la peine de la surprise.Liée au cycle des fêtes cérémonielles, la musique du peuple \u2018Aré\u2019aré est composée selon la même conception du temps: une conception marquée par une intense réflexion politique et par la répétition de séquences fondamentales, proposant ainsi un étroit rapport entre art et société.En plus du disque, ce livre abondamment illustré en couleur contient des textes \u2018aré\u2019aré, une bibliographie et une discographie.Kandinsky, Wassily, Cours du Bauhaus, Paris, Denoël/Gonthier, coll.Médiations, 1978, 240 p.Ce livre, sous-titré \u201cIntroduction à l\u2019art moderne\u201d, présente le troisième texte de Kandinsky qui propose ici l\u2019aboutissement de sa théorisation sur la synthèse des arts.On peut aujourd\u2019hui discuter le rôle et la position réelle de l\u2019oeuvre de Kandinsky dans la formation de l\u2019art \u201cabstrait\u201d, mais on ne peut pas ignorer sa fonction de théoricien.Il était plus difficile de trouver à travers Du spirituel dans l\u2019art la modernité de sa pensée; c\u2019était plus facile avec Point, Ligne, Plan; avec ce troisième ouvrage, qui est les notes de cours du peintre, sont reprises sous une autre forme, plus didactique et au caractère plus expérimental, l\u2019étude approfondie des éléments de la peinture (couleurs, lignes, plans) mais aussi celle des grandes problématiques de l\u2019histoire de l\u2019art (rapport forme-contenu, nécessité de l\u2019art, art-technique-nature).Philippe Sers introduit ces notes de Kandinsky.Namuth, Hans, L\u2019Atelier de Jackson Pollock, Paris, Macula, 1978, 104 p., nombr.ill.n.et b.Cette publication est un supplément au numéro deux de la revue Macula qui avait déjà consacré un \u201cdossier\u201d à Pollock.Autour de l\u2019essai photographique réalisé par Namuth sur Pollock dans son atelier (1950) et puis du film qui le représente peignant sur une plaque de verre (1950), deux essais: celui de Francis V.O\u2019Connor qui indique l\u2019importance de ces photos pour l\u2019histoire de l\u2019art, et celui de Rosalind Krauss qui analyse leur rôle dans la critique d\u2019art américaine quant à l\u2019interprétation de l\u2019Expressionnisme abstrait.Des textes de Pollock, un entretien de B.H.Friedman avec Lee Krosner (1969) et une courte bibliographie complètent ce document: le premier en français sur Pollock.Restany, Pierre, Le Nouveau réalisme, Paris, U.G.E.10/18, 1978, 311 p._______________________________________________________________________________________ : Se trouvent rassemblés dans ce livre des textes que Pierre Restany a publiés depuis plus d\u2019une dizaine d\u2019années, des textes qui témoignent du travail apporté au début des années soixante (1960-1963) par le groupe des Nouveaux Réalistes.L\u2019auteur y propose que malgré la courte durée de ce travail collectif, le style \u201cNouveau Réaliste\u201d s\u2019est imposé comme courant dominant des années soixante: \u201cIl demeurera l'une des images de marque les plus tenaces de l\u2019art de la seconde moitié du XXe siècle.\u201d À relire ces textes anciens et récents, le lecteur pourra évoluer si, comme le suggère Restany, ce mouvement fut déterminant sur le climat culturel des rapports Europe-Amérique ou simplement en regard du contexte de l\u2019École de Paris.La première partie du livre, intitulée \u201cL\u2019Approche théorique\u201d, reprend quatre chapitres des Nouveaux Réalistes déjà publié aux Éditions Planète.La deuxième partie, \u201cLe Constat pratique\u201d, fait état de la situation actuelle des retombées ou de la survie de cette esthétique.Une troisième partie présente une \u201cdocumentation historique\u201d (textes et manifestes, préfaces de catalogues) qui est complétée par une quatrième partie contenant une chronologie et une bibliographie essentielles.Roche, Denis, Notre antéfixe, Paris, Fllammarion, 1978, 143 p.Ce livre est composé d\u2019un texte et d\u2019une quarantaine de photographies.Ces photographies, prises au déclencheur à retardement, sont des autoportraits et l\u2019auteur des photographies et du texte en profite pour réfléchir sur l\u2019écriture d\u2019un texte et la prise photographique.Il propose une équivalence entre ces deux opérations car elles sont des mécaniques, ou des mécanismes, qui ont affaire avec la surface.Dans une préface intitulée \u201cEntrée des machines\u201d, il introduit cette notion de surface et son rapport à la représentation.À partir de la différence inscrite et réclamée entre la photographie et la peinture, il recherche une écriture \u201clibre\u201d qui serait à la littérature ce qu\u2019est la photographie à la peinture.Un moyen se suggère, la répétition à l\u2019infini.Puis vient le texte proprement dit, Notre antéfixe, accompagné d\u2019une section de \u201cnotes et commentaires\u201d sur ce texte.Enfin s\u2019ajoute la série photographique.Un beau livre à voir, pour le réfléchir.Sandler, Irving, The New York School, New York, Harper & Row, Icon Editions, 1978, 365 p., 225 ill.n.et b.et 8 coul.Ce livre, qui a comme sous-titre \u201cThe Painters and Sculptors of the Fifties\u201d, s\u2019intéresse aux artistes de la \u201cdeuxième génération\u201d de l\u2019École de New York: Frankenthaler, Rivers, Mitchell, Leslie, Rauschenberg, Johns, Louis, Held, Oldenburg, Dine, Stella, Kelly, Chamberlain, DiSuvero, Katz, Pearlstein et beaucoup d\u2019autres encore.Sandler analyse cette période comme une transition assurant une continuité entre la première et la troisième; mais son analyse est un peu trop dans l\u2019esprit hagiographique de son The Triumph of the American Painting, A History of Abstract Expressionism (meme éditeur).Importante bibliographie.CATALOGUES D\u2019EXPOSITION Art about Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (19 juil.-14 sept.1978), 160 p., nombr.ill.n.et b.Ce catalogue d\u2019exposition se vend sous forme de livre (New York, Dutton, 1978).Jean Lipman et Richard Marshall présentent ici les artistes américains qui ont utilisé dans leurs oeuvres des références explicites à d\u2019autres oeuvres puisées soit dans leur propre production, dans l\u2019histoire de l\u2019art ancien, moderne ou contemporain, ou plus spécialement dans l\u2019histoire américaine plus ancienne ou actuelle.Dans une introduction, Les Steinberg montre que ce procédé de situation pictural n\u2019est pas particulier ni à l\u2019art contemporain, ni à l\u2019art américain, mais a été actif dans toute l\u2019histoire de la peinture.Les analyses se réduisent trop, cependant, dans ce livre, au caractère iconographique de la citation picturale.Denis Asselin, Galerie l\u2019Anse-aux-Barques, Musée du Québec, Québec (18 oct.-12 nov.1978), 8 p., repr.n.et b.René Payant présente les tableaux récents de cet artiste québécois.Dans un texte intitulé \u201cRisquer le geste\u201d, il propose, rapidement, une lecture d\u2019une nouvelle dimension de cette peinture: son rapport à la sexualité.Par un maniement spécifique de la couleur, l\u2019artiste rejoint une pulsion dionysiaque fondamentale, qui est aujourd\u2019hui critique.Joseph Beuys, édité par J.Schellmann et B.Klüser, 4e édition complétée, Munich, Verlag Schellman & Klüser, 1977, s.p., plus de 300; texte anglais, $17.50 US.(Disponible chez Japp Reitman, N.Y.).Il s\u2019agit ici du catalogue raisonné des \u201cmultiples\u201d de l\u2019artiste allemand.Ce catalogue avait déjà été publié partiellement en 1971, 1972, 1974.La traduction du texte allemand est due à Caroline Tisdall.Artiste, professeur, fondateur de l\u2019Université libre internationale pour la Création et la Recherche interdisciplinaire (1973), Beuys engage l\u2019art sur des problèmes politiques, en reliant l'art et la vie.Il est encore en quelque sorte un \u201cphénomène\u201d artistique que les analyses ne réussissent pas à cerner, encore à réduire.Le catalogue s\u2019ouvre sur deux entretiens (1970, 1977) dans lesquels Beuys s\u2019explique.Viennent ensuite les 167 oeuvres commentées.Une deuxième partie du catalogue présente un résumé, en 76 productions (1947 à 1977), de tout l\u2019oeuvre de Beuys; on y retrouve des dessins, sculptures, objets, environnements, des diagrammes politico-philosophiques, des actions.Charles Gagnon, Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal (1978), 239 p.nombr.repr.c.et n.et b.; textes français et anglais.Cette importante exposition qui ira aussi à Ottawa, Vancouver, Toronto et Winnipeg, est présentée par Philip Fry dans un texte intitulé \u201cFondations (notes sur l\u2019oeuvre de Charles Gagnon)\u201d.Normand Thériault, dans l\u2019introduction du catalogue, trace un portrait \u201cquébécois\u201d de Gagnon en accumulant les petites histoires qui à la fin créent le \u201créel\u201d de l\u2019artiste.Mais, comme le dit au passage Thériault, l\u2019oeuvre de Gagnon \u201cne s\u2019appuie d\u2019abord pas sur une recherche analytique mais se justifie par des choses à être vues\u201d.Voilà ce qui explique le texte de Philip Fry qui s\u2019attache à faire une analyse des objets de Gagnon.Gagnon est hétérogène: peintre aux media multiples, 56 'scents de cetai- :e anglais, $17.M aecWe into- cinéaste, photographe.Fry tente de mettre de l\u2019ordre dans cette production complexe, mais il ne la réduit pas pour autant.Il laisse parler les oeuvres, les écoute; puis laisse parler l\u2019artiste à travers son texte, au risque de le trouer et d\u2019en laisser fuir le sens.Mais tout ce \u201cmouvement\u201d dans le texte est constructeur et Fry en joue habilement.L\u2019emprunt à la théorie \u201carchéologique\u201d de Foucault et les références à la poésie de Rilke servent de cadre (ou de toile de fond, ou de liant?) à son \u201ctravail\u201d d\u2019interprétation.Il faudrait, il faudra reprendre ce texte, et pas seulement pour connaître l\u2019oeuvre de Gagnon.Japan Video Art Festival, C.A.Y.C., Buenos Aires (avril 1978), 24 p., ill.n.et b.Trente-trois artistes japonais présentaient leurs oeuvres au Center for Art and Communication.Jorge Glusberg analyse le phénomène vidéographique qui depuis six ans connaît au Japon un essor florissant.Il en discute les composantes dans une relation nouvelle du réalisme et de l\u2019imaginaire.Jasper Johns (Prints 1970-1977), Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut (27 mars-25 avril 1978), 130 p., repr.n.et b.et c.Cette exposition itinérante ira dans dix musées américains et se terminera en novembre 1979 (Rhode Island School of Design, Providence).Richard S.Field analyse longuement l\u2019importance de ce genre artistique dans l\u2019oeuvre de Johns en particulier et pour la conception moderne de l\u2019art en général.Un catalogue de 250 titres complète le document déjà publié en 1970 par le Philadelphia Museum of Art.Chaque oeuvre y est précisément documentée.Une bibliographie sélective complète ce document important.Les livres d\u2019artistes, une sélection, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Bruxelles (12 mai-15 juin 1978), 78 p.Ce catalogue se résume en réalité à une bibliographie sélective des livres d\u2019artistes; il complète ainsi la bibliographie déjà publiée par Germano Celant dans Offmedia (Bari, Ed.Dedalo, 1977).Douze artistes sont particulièrement sélectionnés qui utilisent fréquemment le livre comme moyen d\u2019expression; une autre section donne un aperçu général de productions des dernières années.Une introduction juxtapose des \u201cstatements\u201d d\u2019artistes sur le livre d\u2019artiste; ces textes ont déjà paru dans Art-Rite, No 14, 1977.Brice Marden, The Pace Gallery, New York (23 sept.-21 oct.1978), 28 p., ill.c.et n.et b.Dans un texte intitulé \u201cFrom\u201d, Jean-Claude Lebensztejn présente les dessins et tableaux récents de Brice Marden, principalement les cinq Annoncia-tions.L\u2019auteur, qui entrecoupe son texte de citations de Marden ou de d\u2019autres sources, cherche à analyser les formes narratives des tableaux \u201cabstraits\u201d (composés de bandes verticales) en regard de l\u2019iconographie suggérée par les titres des tableaux.Mais s\u2019il déclare qu\u2019on peut considérer Marden (qui le dit lui-même) comme un \u201cworker priest, an intermediary between man and mysterious forces\u201d, il ajoute encore ceci: \u201cThe pictorial of Annunciation allows him to affirm both the identity of painting and religion in mystery and the identity of painting with itself through the centuries.There is a danger of misinterpreting the link between these paintings and the theme of the Annunciation.Marden is an abstract painter, not a painter who abstracts.\u201d C\u2019est ce que son analyse essaie de nous démontrer.Richard Serra, Kunsthalle Tübingen (8 mars-2 avril 1978), Kunsthalle Baden-Baden (22 avril-21 mai 1978), 266 p., très nombr.ill.n.et b.; disponible chez Japp Reitman, N.Y., $27.50 US.Ce catalogue d\u2019exposition est une monographie importante de l\u2019oeuvre de l\u2019artiste de 1966 à 1977; près de trois cents pièces y sont répertoriées: des sculptures, vidéos, films, des dessins.Une biographie, une bibliographie et une liste des expositions s\u2019ajoutent aux trois textes (traduits en anglais) qui analysent l\u2019oeuvre de l\u2019artiste: Clara Weyergraf, \u201cFrom \u2018Trough Pieces\u2019 to \u2018Terminal\u2019 \u2014 Study of a Development\u201d, Max Imdahl, \u201cSerra\u2019s \u2018Right Angle Prop\u2019 and \u2018Tot\u2019 \u2014 Concrete Art and Paradigm\u201d, B.H.D.Buchloh, \u201cProcessual Sculpture and Film in the Work of Richard Serra\u201d.Plus un entretien de Richard Serra avec Lizzie Borden.Charles Simonds, Floating Cities and Other Architectures, Westfàlischer Kunstverein Munster (10 mars-9 avril 1978), Bonner Kunstverein (14 avril-21 mai 1978), 60 p., ill.c.et n.et b.; texte anglais.(Disponible chez Japp Reitman, N.Y., $10.00 US.) Herbert Molderings, dans un texte intitulé \u201cArt as Memory\u201d présente l\u2019oeuvre de cet artiste américain qui travaille à la représentation des structures de comportement, de vie, des développements, des idées d\u2019un peuple, à partir des marques que ces philosophies impriment dans la façon de construire son environnement.En contraste avec la cité new-yorkaise (ses quartiers riches et défavorisés), les villes miniatures de Simonds ont une valeur symbolique, critique et politique.Un entretien avec l\u2019artiste, des textes de l\u2019artiste: \u201cThree Peoples\u201d, \u201cFloating Cities\u201d, et une bibliographie sélective complètent ce catalogue.Stella since 1970, The Forth Worth Art Museum, Forth Worth, Texas (19 mars-30 avril 1978), 135 p., nombr.repr.c.et n.et b.Cette exposition itinérante est présentée au Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal du 5 nov.au 15 déc.1978.Le Musée a pour cette occasion traduit en français le texte du catalogue de Philip Leider.Le texte de Leider n\u2019est pas une très bonne analyse de la complexité des oeuvres de Stella (célèbre par ses Black Paintings des années soixante), mais il apporte beaucoup d\u2019informations quant aux techniques et à la réalisation des Séries des villages polonais (1970-1973), des Séries brésiliennes (1974-1975) et des Séries d\u2019oiseaux exotiques (1976-1977).Une bibliographie sélective complète ce catalogue.Bill Vazan, Canada House Gallery, London (7 sept.-11 oct.1978), 15 p.repr.Dans un texte intitulé \u201cAxial Structures\u201d, Diana Nemiroff présente des oeuvres photographiques et vidéographiques de Bill Vazan en montrant comment il s\u2019intéresse à l\u2019espace qui existe entre le sujet et l\u2019objet, c\u2019est-à-dire ici entre l\u2019artiste et le monde.Vazan veut rendre compte de cette relation, de l\u2019expérience de cette relation, la sienne.La photographie est le médium fondamental de son travail.Ici les oeuvres exposées en montrent deux utilisations: comme médium premier ou comme médium second dans le cas des photographies qui documentent des land pieces.Mais dans les deux cas il est question d\u2019archéologie.REVUES ET PÉRIODIQUES Édition, No 1, 1978, 40 p., ill.n.et b.; à Édition, P.O.Box 403, Station A, Vancouver, B.C., Canada V6C 2N2 Cette revue, si on peut nommer ainsi cette publication, est publiée par un groupe d\u2019artistes, actuellement ceux \u2014 plus de vingt \u2014 qui participent à ce numéro, avec la collaboration de Intermedia et la Artists Gallery.Chaque artiste est responsable des pages qui sont mises à sa disposition: ici la photographie domine.Aucun thème commun, au moins apparemment.Erotiques/Revue d\u2019Esthétique, no 1-2, 1978, Paris, U.G.E.10/18, 432 p.Ce numéro consacre à Eros une étude spéciale.Dans l\u2019état actuel des réflexions en sciences humaines, et des réflexions sur l\u2019art en particulier, où la notion de sensibilité et l\u2019intérêt pour les mouvements du corps font retour, cette analyse sur les \u201cconduites du désir\u201d sont bienvenues.Avec, entre autres, la participation de Philippe Dubois, Michel Zeraffa, Gilbert Lascaux, Dominique Noguez, Daniel Charles.Signalons aussi la réédition avec mise à jour du numéro spécial de la Revue d\u2019Esthétique: cinéma: théorie, lectures qui contient des interventions de R.Arnheim, R.Barthes, M.Dufrenne, R.Jacobson, J.-F.Lyotard, J.Mekas, C.Metz, E.Panofsky, P.-P.Pasolini, etc.RENÉ PAYANT LETTRES \u2014 SIGNES \u2014 ÉCRITURES Un intérêt appuyé se manifeste de plus en plus depuis quelque temps pour la lettre, le signe, la graphie.Il y a près d\u2019un an se tenaient presque simultanément à Paris au Centre culturel du Marais une exposition d'Écritures, les musiciens, les peintres, les poètes et leurs partitions en parcours imaginés par Jean-Yves Bosseur (Appel, Bory, Butor, Cage, Parant, Vachey, Grygar, Heidsieck.) et à Bruxelles une exposition de Graphies de Baal, Barthes, Dermisache, Dotremont, Guyotat, Gysin, Podolski.au Musée d\u2019art moderne à l\u2019initiative de Marc Dachy à partir du numéro spécial de Luna-Park (Transédition).En janvier dernier c\u2019est à la Maison de la Culture de Rennes que Françoise Chatel montrait des Typo/graphies-Ecritures d\u2019Apollinaire (calligrammes) à Emmett Williams en passant par Baal, Bryen (désécritures), Dotremont (logogram-mes), Marinetti (mots en liberté futuristes), Zdanévitch (langage zaoum), Moholy-Nagy, Lissitzky, etc.Au jourd\u2019hui c\u2019est au Konsthall de Malmô que Roberto Altmann monte une énorme exposition Tecken \u2014 Lettres signes écritures avec un important catalogue bilingue de 200 pages et des textes de Altmann, Hôgestàtt, Liljedahl, Dachy et Bosseur notamment sur la calligraphie, la peinture gestuelle, les pictogrammes, les écritures imaginaires, le corps comme écriture, l\u2019écriture conceptuelle, les nouvelles perspectives de l\u2019espace littéraire superbement illustré avec des oeuvres de Rodtchenko, Jiri Kolar, Haussmann, Burroughs, Kriwet, Finlay; P.A.Gette, Torn Phillips, Degottex, Jasper Johns, Dotremont, Mohr ainsi que des planches d\u2019anciens alphabets persans ou orientaux.Cet ensemble passionnant dédié par Altmann à tous les enfants Scandinaves qui ne savent encore ni lire ni écrire et à tous les analphabètes du monde entier se termine par une enquête auprès des revues expérimentales \u201cen raison de leur rôle déterminant dans la littérature de création\u201d avec les animateurs de Doc (k)s (Marseille), Luna-Park (Bruxelles-Paris) et Apeiros (Paris-Vaduz).Le catalogue de Malmô n\u2019est pas diffusé mais peut être obtenu auprès de Transédition, rue Paul Emile Janson 21, 1050 Bruxelles.57 Danse Lire ci-dessous quelques notes de la danseuse américaine Lucinda Childs, que nous publions à l\u2019occasion de sa venue à Montréal le 7 décembre prochain.Renseignements: Musée des beaux-arts, tél.:285-1609 My dances are set repeatable forms, danced without musical accompaniment.In dancing, however, distinct rhythmic patterns are both audible \u2014 through the sounds made in dancing: jumps, hops, pivot turns \u2014 and visible \u2014 in the manner that the body is used.Movement segments are subject to repetition or ordered in additive or permutational sequences.Even though phrases are repeated, they are never repeated in exactly the same manner.The dances exist in the time it takes to exhaust a given selection of variables that can be utilized while continuing to introduce the material from a different point of view.With respect to the solo program, the spatial scheme for each dance is very simple.Two of the dances utilize a single diagonal only, the full length back and forth across the performance space.Apart from the rhythm, another strong element is that of ongoing motion; as a dancer, I never remain in one fixed area.I am constantly moving between fixed distances in space.The dance vocabulary is not directly derived from traditional dance movement, although I have received formal training in both ballet and modern dance.Lucinda Childs\tPhoto: Jack Mictchell The performance quality is closer to a natural kinesthetic.The arms sometimes move very freely, in accordance with the momentum of the body in motion.There is no literary content in the material I perform.My aesthetic concern is visual and auditory.The variations that one sees in the dances are based upon subtle rearrangements of the material, thus without strong contrast or astonishing shifts, from one kind of activity to another.I limit myself in each dance to an extensive exploration of a small amount of material, rather than a superficial exploration of a lot of material.This remains a rich area for me in my present work, as it enables one to focus attention on rhythmic and spatial configurations, rather than the presentation of movement content alone.The structure underlying each dance is not arbitrary or created by mathematical systems.The sequences of movement phrases in the dances are selected by me through improvisation techniques, to arrive at a presentation of selected variations which follows a logic which is inherent in each dance.The intention from the point of view of the spectator is to provide an intense experience of listening and looking at dance.Lucinda Childs «ÉÜ ERRATA: Dans Parachute 12, Musiques au Présent, p.66, 3e colonne, lire Miljenko Horvat/Conversation avec Lenie Tristano, 1977.EVAN PARKER Evan Parker \u2014 John Stevens/The Longest Night, Vol.1 \u2014 Ogun 120 (Duo Saxophones/perc.) Vol.2 \u2014 Ogun 420 Evan Parker (s s,ts)/Real Time, Ictus 0006 avec Andrea Centazzo (perc) et Alvin Curran Evan Parker (s s)/Monoceros, Incus 27 (1978) quatre improvisations pour saxophone soprano \".one driving force will have been developed as a response to musical problems posed by other musicians.So, for example, the need for long breaths, long phrase-lengths moving into the circular breathing, may well have been stimulated by the need to find a response to Derek\u2019s feedback techniques, or my personal type of articulation which involves an unorthodox use of the tone in articulation is probably in response to the need for clarity at higher than average pulse-feelings, or tempos if you like, but they\u2019re not really tempos.The two basic poles in the music have been music that was slightly too fast to be counted or slightly too slow to be counted.The middle ground always seems to be vacated at any given point.Even during periods where we\u2019ve been aware of the lack of a middle ground in the music, technically speaking, as a problem, it still seems to be there only as something whose presence is avoided as soon as it\u2019s established.You could say that the few basic techniques that I\u2019ve evolved for myself have been concerned with a more complete expression of those two poles in the music.The other stuff which is where I suspect the middle ground for me lies is in the cross-fingering material; but this is not especially personal to me.It\u2019s manipulation of the air column in the instrument so that you achieve a more complex set of vibrations, through so-called cross-fingering.And there are so many possibilités once you start on that path that the problem is really finding a context in which to frame the many possibilities.Strings of them on their own don\u2019t really make much sense, it\u2019s just a question of feeding the denser overtone structures into the overall pattern of the music.(.) It seems to me that very few of the players have yet arrived at a clear-cut conceptual understanding of the difference between improvisation and composition, that much of the musical training that many of the musicians have had has been in schools of compositional value systems and that there\u2019s a tendency to judge improvised music in terms of composed music values.That\u2019s not always appropriate.If I want to construct and insure a certain type of melodic music, then I know the ways to go about that.I\u2019ve chosen to operate in music in a different way than that and it makes it unlikely that the more formal type of melody will ever emerge.Certainly fragments of melody emerge in the overall context of a sound continuum, and that\u2019s about all I want in music really.The melodies are not there because I don\u2019t want them.\u201d Evan Parker, extraits d\u2019une entrevue publiée dans le Magazine Impetus #6, Londres \u2014 1977, p.256-257 PARUTIONS RÉCENTES Anton Webern/Oeuvre Intégrale, coffret de quatre disques CBS \u2014 79402, Pierre Boulez Steve Reich/Music for 18 Musicians, ECM Tom Phillips/Irma (opera), Obscure 9.Musique de Gavin Bryars Omette Coleman/Body Meta, Artists House AH-1 (1978) Rayer Charlie Haden (B) \u2014 Hampton Hawes (p)/Duet, AH-4 Jim Hall (g) \u2014 Red Mitchell (b)/Duet, AH-5 Musica Elettronica Viva/United Patchwork, Horo dou- evan parker MONOCEROS 58 5.Ifs ^nt he p overall I erstandingfl|t^ J^po* î Schoo,s ;;satendeflc,:, : :;i1 Posed ms! \u2018 :e'lfi»anltoci i O'OPIc music, : \"ve chosen t{ ?-'îhan thatands: [ atypeof meiajjT 'oots of met» \u2018 \u2022 sound continm I '¦sc really, \\ scn't want them' ' r -e oubliée dansfe* \u2018 '?T p.256-25?: coffret de quatre lez nECM re 3.Musiquede osts House ® içs ip|/Duet,AH-tel AH-5 ble HDP-15/16 avec Steve Lacy, Karl Berger, Garrett List, Richard Teitelbaum, Frederic Rzewski et Alvin Curran.Lee Konitz (as,) Martial Solal (p)/Duplicity (duo), Horo HDP-17/18 Karl Berger (p,vb, perc)/Changing the Time, Horo HDP-21/22 (solo) Sun Ra/Other Voices, Other Blues, Horo HDP-23/24 quatuor avec John Gilmore (ts), Michael Ray (tp, perc) et Luqmad Ali (dr).Sun Ra/New Steps, HDP-25/26 personnel idem.Steve Lacy/Chatch, Horo HZ-08 (Duo) avec Kent Carter (B) David Murray (ts)/Surreal Saxophone, HZ-09 (Solo).Globe Unity Orchestra/Improvisations, Japo Heiner Stadler/A Tribute to Monk and Bird, Tomato Tom-2-9002 (2 disques) Steve Lacy/Clinkers, Hat Hut #F.Solo, 9 juin 77, cinq pièces: \u201cTrickles, Duck, Coastline, Micro Worlds, Clinkers\u201d.Phineas Newborn (p)/Lookout, Phineas is Back, Pablo 2310801 Frank Ahrold/Three Poems Of Sylvia Plath, (1971), Cri-380 Conlon Nancarrow/Studies For Player Piano 1750 Arch 1768.Anna Lockwood/World Rhythms, New Music for electronic and recorded media, 1750 ARCH 1765, de même que des compositions de Pauline Oliveros, Laurie Anderson.David Rosenboom/And Out Come The Night Ears 1750 Arch, Improvisationally developed work for solo piano interfaced to an electronic system.(1978) Irwin Nyiregyhazi (p)/Plays Liszt, album double Columbia M2-34598 Bengt Hambraeus/Concrete And Synthesizer Music, McGill University Records 76001.Trois compositions originales: 1- Intrada: \u201cCalls\u201d, 1975, 2- Tornado 1976, 3-\tTides 1974, enregistrées au Studio de musique électronique de la faculté de Musique de l\u2019Université McGill \u2014 1976, disponible aux guichets de la Salle de concert Pollack, faculté de Musique, Université McGill, 555 ouest, rue Sherbrooke, Montréal, Québec, H3A 1E3 (392-4501 ou 392-8224) ^wofk, Horoûft- i REVUES/LIVRES Musique en jeu No 30, éditions du Seuil, 1978, $9.30, Debussy/E.A.Poe, et Wagner.Ivanka Stoianova/Geste \u2014 Texte \u2014 Musique, éditions 10/18 No 11031 Bério/Kagel/Stockhausen/Philip Glass etc.Roland de Candé/Histoire Universelle de la Musique, des origines à l\u2019époque contemporaine, éditions du Seuil, 2 volumes reliés de 656 et 528 pages respectivement, $75.00 Anna Butkovsky \u2014 Hewitt/With Gurdkieff in St.Petersburg and Paris, éditions Routledge & Kegan Paul, Londres, 1978, 157 p., $12.50 p.113: Improvising, un chapitre sur la musique improvisée et curative.Ernest G.McClain/The Myth of Invariance, (the origin of the Gods, Mathematics and Music from the Rig Veda to Plato), Shambhala ed\u201e Boulder & London, 1978 \u2014 216 p.$7.50 \u201cIn the Myth of invariance, music is recognized as the STEVE REICH Music for 18 Musicians ¦ ¦ \u2022 .- .-