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Systems in the Post-War Art School: Basic Design, Groundcourse and Hornsey Catherine Sloan VOLUME I PhD The University of Edinburgh 2013 1 THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH ABSTRACT OF THESIS Regulation 3.1.14 of the Postgraduate Assessment Regulations for Research Degrees refers These regulations are available via: http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/academic- services/policies-regulations/regulations/assessment Name of Candidate: Catherine Sloan Address : 10/2 Dalmeny Street, Edinburgh Postal Code: EH6 8RA Degree: Doctor of Philosophy Title of Thesis: Systems in the Post-War Art School: Basic Design, Groundcourse and Hornsey No. of words in the main text of Thesis: 85,000 This thesis makes the first sustained attempt to locate post-war British art school pedagogy in relation to systems-inspired cultural practice after World War II. I explore how in the post-war era in Britain, system, cybernetic and network theories had an instrumental presence in visual arts pedagogy and practice which marked a fundamental shift in the values of cultural production. This was informed both by General System Theory, which had emerged in biology before the war (GST) and its part in the new systemic presence across culture and economy in the wake of the war. I draw out this cultural trend through the examination of student work of the period, pedagogical documents and new interview material with teachers and students. The immediate post-war years form one of the most vital periods of technological development of all time, in which the physical and biological sciences played an ever-more prominent – and integrated - part. The pedagogies of 1945-1970 incorporated a range of systemic and mechanical approaches into creative practice, which had a clear link to contemporaneous technological developments. That mechanisms, networks and systemic approaches were a fundamental aspect of visual arts pedagogies of the period is a phenomenon which has never been analysed and this is the task of this thesis. This was manifested both in the subject matter of classes and courses and in the teaching structures and models that this thesis will examine. These consist of the Basic Design movement, Groundcourse and the Hornsey protest of 1968. The presence of mechanics as process, pedagogy, practice and symbol within British art education demonstrates the evolving importance of technology within culture. With this in mind, each case study within this thesis investigates systems characteristics of British art school pedagogies during the period. The underlying aim is not to create a narrative account of each pedagogical moment, but rather to pursue the material and cultural influences which shaped their development. 2 Dedicated with love and thanks to Morna Sloan and Richard Sloan 3 ‘As the organism and its environment are to be treated as a single system, the dividing line between ‘organism’ and ‘environment’ becomes partly conceptual, and to that extent arbitrary. Once this flexibility of division is admitted, almost no bounds can be put to its application. The chisel in a sculptor’s hand can be regarded as a part of the complex biophysical mechanism that is shaping the marble, or it can be regarded as part of the material which the nervous system is attempting to control. The bones in a sculptor’s arm can be similarly regarded either as part of the organism or part of the ‘environment’ of the nervous system. Variables within the body may be justifiably regarded as the ‘environment’ of some other part.’1 William Ross Ashby 1960 1 Ashby, W. R. (1960) Design for a Brain. Chapman and Hall. London. p. 40 4 Table of Contents 0) Introduction p. 8 i) Systems and the Art School p. 9 ii) Critical Histories p. 11 iii) Methodology: An Outline p. 22 iv) Exploring Pedagogy, Power and Systems p. 26 v) The Dynamics of Power in Art Education Policy p. 34 vi) Technology in Art and Post-War Pedagogy p. 46 vii) Case Study Outlines p. 51 1) Basic Design p. 54 1.1) Beyond the Bauhaus p. 55 1.2) The Origins and Development of Basic Design p. 64 i) National Art Education Policy and Basic Design p. 65 ii) Herbert Read, the ICA and the Psychology of Basic Design p. 74 iii) William Johnstone, Art and Post-War Industry at Central p. 78 iv) The Loss of Basic Design’s Origins p. 84 v) Johnstone's Organisational Systems and the Growth of Basic Design p. 89 vi) A Mechanised Psychology of Art and Basic Design p. 95 1.3) Systems and Basic Design at King’s College p. 102 i) Hamilton and Pasmore at King’s College p. 103 ii) Sigfried Giedion and Mechanics in Culture p. 104 iii) On Growth and Form and Mechanization Takes Command p. 110 iv) Basic Design Analytical Drawing Exercises and Design Patents p. 116 v) Richard Hamilton and On Growth and Form p. 126 vi) Pasmore, Hamilton and On Growth and Form p. 137 vii) The Mechanisation of Biological Form p. 142 viii) Aspects of Form and Systems p. 151 5 1.4) Biology, War and the Thinking Machine in Basic Design Pedagogy p. 153 i) Systems and WWII p. 154 ii) Gestalt and the Structured Whole in Basic Design Exercises p. 161 iii) The Thinking Machine, the Organising Principle & Anatomy Exercises p. 168 iv) Systems Theories: From Biology to Warfare p. 182 v) The Abstract Point and the Atom in Basic Design p. 192 2) Groundcourse p. 209 2.1) Experiments in Foundation Studies p. 210 i) The Introduction of the Foundation Course p. 213 ii) Roy Ascott: From Basic Design to Groundcourse p. 216 iii) Ascott’s Early Cybernetics p. 219 iv) Cybernetics in Art in the Early 1960s p. 226 2.3) Roy Ascott, the Cold War and Cybernetics as Language p. 229 i) Roy Ascott and the Cold War p. 230 ii) Ground Control as Visual Environment p. 233 iii) Cybernetics, Systems and Social Organisms p. 236 2.4) Groundcourse: Behaviourism, Organicism and Structure p. 238 i) The Philosophy of Groundcourse p. 239 ii) Analytical Drawing, Cybernetics and Behaviour p. 240 iii) Reprogramming Students: Behaviourism in Teaching Practice p. 244 iv) Cybernetic Interactions: Aircraft Control and the Analogue p. 247 v) Organisation as Organism p. 257 vi) Analogue Machines and the Social Organism p. 259 vii) Interactivity and Behaviourism p. 264 6 2.5) The Analogue Game: Systems, Structure and Control p.273 i) Games within Groundcourse Pedagogy p. 274 ii) From Analogue Machines to Games p. 275 iii) The Cybernetics of Game Design p. 262 iv) Visual Parallels: Aircraft Control and the Groundcourse Game p. 267 3) Hornsey: The Pedagogy of Protest p. 285 3.1) Introduction p. 286 3.2) The Conditions for Protest p. 292 i) The Hornsey Take-Over p. 293 iii) Art History, Academic Equivalence and Class Division p. 296 iii) Criticism Culture: Practice at Hornsey before the Protest p. 304 iv) Complementary Studies: Political Contextualisation of Pedagogy p. 308 3.3) CONTROL: p. 322 System Disruption & Culture Jamming as Pedagogical Protest i) Control and Systems Pedagogy p. 323 ii) Performing Pedagogy p. 330 3.4) The Network System: Structured Pedagogy and Liberal Education p. 340 i) From Linear Systems to Networks p. 341 ii) Product Design: Engineering the Curriculum p. 349 iii) Light-Sound Workshop at Hornsey p. 352 iv) The Hornsey Network and Agency p. 354 4) Conclusion p. 357 Table of Illustrations p. 378 Bibliography p. 385 7 0. Introduction Groundcourse Behavioural Project 1965 8 i) Systems and the Art School This thesis is the first sustained attempt to locate post-war British art school pedagogy in relation to systems-inspired cultural practice after World War II. In the post-war era in Britain, system, cybernetic and network theories had an instrumental presence in visual arts pedagogy and practice which marked a fundamental shift in the values of cultural production. This was informed both by General System Theory, which had emerged in biology before the war (GST) and its part in the new systemic presence across culture and economy in the wake of the war.2 Underlying both was one of the most vital periods of technological development of all time, in which the physical and biological sciences played an ever-more prominent – and integrated - part. That mechanisms, networks and systemic approaches were a fundamental aspect of visual arts pedagogies of the period is a phenomenon which has never been analysed and this is the task of this thesis. As noted this analysis will be very much situated in a post-war context. The impact of mechanised warfare and the resultant integration of systems thinking across disciplines after World War II had a cultural legacy, as the technology of every age does. The art 2 General System Theory made an instrumental contribution to logistics and weapon design during WWII and after the war there was a spate of publications dealing with systems identification and behaviour.