Queensland Art Gallery Presscuttings Book 8 : Pressclippings, 1977-1981

6 en- were Royal ctorof llliem– duca– o the es by zes to with a r, Dr. ght of the ivided Spina socla- ;,ell Craig, •. Th• Sund • Y Man - - - - - - -- ~ - ·· .,, NOVEMBER 30, 1980 l", THI CHIIONICU ij!1w.;;w;oo • Ahi§l6ihhh§0 - An exceptional show of Op art The Yucov Apm ex– blbltloa tllded I few days qo at the Queenaland An Oallery, llrilbane. This Is an exceptional show of Op art: 1 replica of which was simultaneously displayed at the Guuenheim Musebm, New York. My daushter viewed the latter show in U.S.A. and after– wards, on her arrival in Toowoomba, we com– pared the two exhibitions. The main difference between .A11m's works displayed in the two venue sites lies in the matter of scale. Basically the same con– cept exists and the same forms arc used for both pictures and sculpture, bu1 some of 1hr U.S.A. "All my Ideas, all my forms, are bas11d on parriclpallon . " Agam conservation wlrh Erienn11 de Monr- p11zar. pictures are many metres long and sculpture there is much larger. An advan1aae of the Guuenhcim settina is the circular internal desian or that building . This enables specially chosen Op art works 10 be seen 10 advantage from above eye level as well as in the usual way. In Ihe basement there the viewer enters a darkened room where col- 1/~ ~~11 oured slides sho vini the triangle, the circle and the square (the forms on which this Op an is based) arc projected on 10 a screen. Specially desianed rurni1ure echoes 1he Op art themes of 1he pain- 1ings. In Brisbane, a video 1ape assis1s lhe viewer in its portrayal of the artist 'explaining, In the French language, his particular outlook 10 life and art. The work of Agam can be seen as a highly com– plex development of that 1radition of abstract ar1 which begins with the Russian Cons1ruclivis1s, especially with Malevich, and which emerges as 1he Op art or the 1960s. Malevich said 1ha1 his aim was 10 achieve "the supremacy of pure sen– sibility in art" and his work was extended through ideas developed in the Bauhaus and later through the ideas or Moholy-Nagy and Joseph Albers. Op art, in its simples1 form, explores types or ii- lusion where normal pro– cesses or seeing can be dynamically influenced by c~rtain optical phenomena in the pain– tings. Albers calls "op" all paintings dealing with "the discrepancy between physical fact and psychic effect." In 1hc work or Dr Agam, however, other rac1ors are important and his aes1he1ic in1cn1ions br– ing him close 10 some or 1he notions which underlie 1hc work or those two very different early 1wcn- 1ie1h century abstract painters, Mondrian and Kandinsky. For Agam, son or a rabbi, his own art mirrors rcaii1y as seen through 1hr eyes or Judaic mystics. This ou1look results in an art where images are con– tinuously transformed 1hrough movement or one kind or ano1her and which 1herefore, are also subject 01 change in 1ime. Agam says, " All my ideas, all my forms, arc based on participation,"