Daniel Thomas : Newspaper writings

His work Is always the same, but always different, which means that his subject-matter and his Similarly, in our three- formal obsessions (undu- dimensional world we lating curves' are always could not comprehend the same, but that his four (or morel-dimen- treatment is always differ- sional phenomena If we ent, It varies, and indeed encountered them. Improves. Artists, more than other Sy the way, I wonder if people, sometimes have an subject -matter and formal uneasy sense of these extra obsessions aren't, in the dimensions. end, identical? Surely the f Last year Guy Stuart's ormal obsession comes first, and then the artist notorious floor (or was it a roof?) undulated up finds a subject to fit the from the entrance of Gal- form'? And since he feels lery A, Melbourne, or else the f inns so strongly he it surged down in than- bring the subject to life? nets from the left-hand wall. You couldn't really tell where it had come from, or what it was doing in that room. Just like the slice, of finger that the In- habitant of a sh-et of paper would encounte: Col Jordan's paintings and sculptures now at the Bonython Gallery have a similar sense of interpene- trating dimensions. Undulating slabs of color have emerged from walls, and these we have called paintings. Others have come up out of the floor for flowed into it from a point in mid -airs, .and these we have called sculptures. Since prints are more frankly decorative in in- tention, his prints may be better than his paintings. Col Jordan's new exhibi- tion renews ltls old obses- sions in several ways. The perspex-slice sculptures now have additional wavy cutouts oi extensitins, like When he first emerged- clouds invading. was it l964?-he seemed a The same clouds, but pioneer of Op Art in Aus- smokier, appear In paint - trails. Certainly he pre- ings, along with tubes, and ferred flat surfaces, hard remind us that Jordan, edges and bright color, but unlike doctrinaire Op color interaction or optical tricks were not going on for their own sakes. They existed, if at all, to give a mood, and it was a mood of unease. They also described the slices of alt -n dimension ' t Is a 1 massed through the planes he chose to work on. And the uneasiness was a mat- ter of never knowing what extra dimension might manifest Itsalf next: it was a kind of science -fiction unease. The current exhibition demands great respect. When Jordan began, he was, stylistically, a ,pioneer in Use context of Austra- The dimension game TRY to imagine a two-dimensional form of life, living, say, in a sheet of paper. Whatever would they make of the slices of three-dimensional nature that they encountered? Like, for example, a Ilan art. He isn't now, but human finger piercing the he's still a pioneer within sheet of paper. They the context of his own art, would know the diameter that is, he is still explor- of the finger and its inner ing, his work Ls still fresh. contents, but its three- dimensional extension be- yond the plane would be beyond comprehension. DISTINCTION As with most art these days the distinction be- tween painting and aculp- tare is quite irrelevant, and only blinds us to what the artist is doing. BALANCE Other artists in town this week have failed to keep the balance between subject -matter and form. At the Macquarie Rod- ney Milgate's forms for his very Interesting subject - matter haven't varied much and were never very pion - Perhaps there was never a formal obsession to be- gin with. At Waters, Arthur Wick's pretty color -fields don't seem to have much content at all though time hasn't yet allowed us to learn his work fully. ART by ,danielthemtis Artists, has often been very interested in sombre blacks and browns. Mona Ilessing, also at Bonython, shows woven woollens. They're not rugs, though there's no reason why a beautiful rug shouldn't be hung on a wall, as are her strange objects, or why It shouldn't be draped over a suspended rod, and turned into a room-divider, as also are some of these exhibits. They are built up mainly from oblong woven panels, which usually have a fringed lower edge, and sometimes there are pairs of folded flaps which are curiously like collars. So these weavings are almost clothes, They are occasionally quite like a poncho or a shift, only they are scaled for small giants, not for ordinary people. I doubt if Mona Hessing knew that her weavings would end up like clothes, but the effect is imposing and Impressive, and lifts the work right out of the category of decorative art. Harald Szeemann visited Australia last week to look its over. He Ls director of next year's Documents at Kassel, Germany, the world's most important survey of contemporary art. His Doctnnertta will be an "Enquiry into Reality," and as well as painting and sculpture it will include "Social iconography" as manifested In clothes, tattooing, banknotes, sc lence tic tion, gift -shop kitsch. So Mona Hess ng's near - clothes and Col Jordan's hint of science-fiction are closer than they might realise to the "Szeemann's Choice" exhibition in the next room. describe it next week. "TELEGRAPH" Sydney, N.S.W. -2 MAY 1971