For-The-Sake-Of-The-Thing-Itself.Pdf
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I Introduction .................................................................................................................................................................................. 5 Works ............................................................................................................................................................................................. 13 Alfred Wallis, Trawler and a Sail Boat ................................................................................................................................... 14 Anonymous, Verwood Jug ....................................................................................................................................................... 16 Bernard Leach, Owl .................................................................................................................................................................... 18 Shoji Hamada, Albarello Vase ................................................................................................................................................. 20 Neolithic Period Scandinavian Thin Butted Polished Axe Head .................................................................................... 22 Neolithic Period Scandinavian Thin Butted Polished Axe Head .................................................................................... 24 Neolithic Period Scandinavian Thin Butted Polished Axe Head .................................................................................... 26 Bronze Age Earthenware Bowl with Lug Handles ............................................................................................................. 28 Bronze Age Earthenware Spouted Vessel with Two Loop Handles ............................................................................. 30 Bronze Age Earthenware Jug with Strap Handle .............................................................................................................. 32 Barbara Hepworth, Project ...................................................................................................................................................... 34 Anonymous, Seto Mingei ‘Horse Eye’ Dish with Painted Spirals .................................................................................. 36 Richard Long, Untitled ............................................................................................................................................................... 38 Bernard Leach, Moulded Slipware Dish with Japanese Mingei Willow Tree Design ............................................... 40 Eliot Hodgkin, Objets Trouvés ................................................................................................................................................. 42 Shoji Hamada, Stoneware Dish with Broken Stem Motifs ............................................................................................... 44 Frank Auerbach, To The Studios ............................................................................................................................................. 46 Frank Auerbach, To The Studios ............................................................................................................................................. 48 Kogei Magazine No. 53 .................................................................................................................................................................... 50 Graham Sutherland, Wading Birds ........................................................................................................................................ 52 Text ................................................................................................................................................................................................. 59 Introduction ‘Not Ideas About the Thing but the Thing Itself’ – Wallace Stevens This exhibition and accompanying catalogue are the culmination of innumerable conversations that we have had in the three years since we started Hunter / Whitfield. As visitors to our spaces in Marylebone and Clerkenwell will know, we are interested not only in contemporary art, but by artworks and artefacts from the past. It has been a great pleasure to see how both the artists and collectors with whom we’ve had the good fortune to work are also joyfully open-minded and pluralistic in their interests. With that in mind, we have brought together a group of artworks and objects that reflect some of our own tastes and interests outside our contemporary programme. The exhibition, which comprises mainly 20th century British artworks and ancient artefacts, is not strictly thematic, but rather driven by our own aesthetic impulses and fascination with the material. It is our hope that the viewer can take time to relish each object, painting and drawing in their own right, rather than seeing them merely as devices to illustrate a grander curatorial narrative. There are, however, links that can be drawn between the works which go beyond the merely visual or the historical kinship of the modern British pictures. The perceptive viewer will see that a Cornish thread runs through this show, starting with Alfred Wallis and Barbara Hepworth and Shoji Hamada (indeed, even the clay that Richard Long used in Untitled is sourced in St Austell, Cornwall). Many of the works and objects gathered here also share an affinity with the earth, the ground; be it in tonality or origin, they allude to the cyclical nature of both life and art. In his book, A Potter’s World, Bernard Leach writes of meeting Japanese craftsmen from whom he ‘learnt to expect beauty as a part of normal life and as a necessity.’ … ‘things should be done for the sake of the thing itself.’ It is with this ethos that we have brought together the objects and artworks in this exhibition. Ben Hunter & Orlando Whitfield, 2017 Works Alfred Wallis (British, 1855–1942) Trawler and a Sail Boat Oil and pencil on card 25.5 x 30.5 cm 14 Anonymous Verwood Jug, Early 19th C. Stoneware 30.5 x 24 x 23 cm 16 Bernard Leach (British, 1887–1979) Owl, 1950s Pencil on Japanese rice paper 12 x 12 cm 18 Shoji Hamada (Japanese, 1894–1978) Albarello Vase, 1960s Stoneware with broken stem motif brushed over white ‘hakeme’ glaze 22 x 16 x 16 cm 20 Scandinavian Thin Butted Polished Axe Head, Neolithic Period Flint 29 x 9 x 3.75 cm 22 Scandinavian Thin Butted Polished Axe Head, Neolithic Period Flint 24 x 7 x 3.25 cm 24 Scandinavian Thin Butted Polished Axe Head, Neolithic Period Flint 32.5 x 7.5 x 3.25 cm 26 Bronze Age Earthenware Bowl with Lug Handles 20.5 x 27.5 x 27.5 cm 28 Bronze Age Earthenware Spouted Vessel with Two Loop Handles 17.5 x 14 x 16 cm 30 Bronze Age Earthenware Jug with Strap Handle 21.5 x 13 x 13 cm 32 Barbara Hepworth (1903–75) Project, 1945 Oil and pencil on board 19 x 26.7 cm 34 Anonymous Seto Mingei ‘Horse Eye’ Dish with Painted Spirals, 19th C. Glazed stoneware 27.5 x 27.5 x 6 cm 36 Richard Long (British, b. 1945) Untitled, 1988 China clay on paper mounted to masonite 190 x 160 cm 38 Bernard Leach (British, 1887–1979) Moulded Slipware Dish with Japanese Mingei Willow Tree Design, 1930s Glazed stoneware 33 x 25.5 x 5 cm 40 Eliot Hodgkin (British, 1905–1987) Objets Trouvés, 1961 Tempera on board 12 x 23 cm 42 Shoji Hamada (Japanese, 1894–1978) Stoneware Dish with Broken Stem Motifs, 1960s Glazed stoneware with tenmoku glaze 27 x 27 x 4.5 cm 44 Frank Auerbach (British, b. 1931) To the Studios, 1982 Crayon, felt tip pen and Tipp-Ex on paper 29.5 x 18.5 cm 46 Frank Auerbach (British, b. 1931) To the Studios, 1982 Crayon, felt tip pen and Tipp-Ex on paper 29.5 x 19.5 cm 48 Kogei Magazine No. 53, May 1935 Paperback book with hand-dyed & printed cover 22 x 25 x 1 cm 50 Graham Sutherland (British, 1903–80) Wading Birds Oil on canvas 138 x 64 cm 52 Text Alfred Wallis (British, 1855–1942) Anonymous Bernard Leach (British, 1887–1979) Shoji Hamada (Japanese, 1894–1978) Trawler and a Sail Boat Verwood Jug, Early 19th C. Owl, 1950s Albarello Vase, 1960s Oil and pencil on card Stoneware Pencil on Japanese rice paper Stoneware with broken stem motif brushed 25.5 x 30.5 cm 30.5 x 24 x 23 cm 12 x 12 cm over white ‘hakeme’ glaze 22 x 16 x 16 cm Waddington Galleries, London Private Collection, UK Private Collection, UK Lord & Lady Rix Frederick Carlton Ball, California, USA Thence by descent A beautiful example of an early 19th century jug Born in Japan in 1887, Bernard Leach became Private Collection, UK made at the Verwood pottery in Dorset. This is one of Britain’s foremost potters. He studied in Self-taught Cornish Alfred Wallis started painting on a classic English form developed over centuries Tokyo before returning to England in 1920 with Shoji Hamada began his career as an artist-potter found objects (this work is painted on a hard-back and identified by Bernard Leach as being in Shoji Hamada to set up a studio in St Ives. Here in Japan after studying at the Tokyo Institute of book binding) only in his seventies after a career as his mind the perfect jug. The Verwood pottery holds he constructed the first traditional Japanese Technology. He later met Bernard Leach in Tokyo, a merchant sailor. His works came to the attention an iconic status by lovers of country pottery. This is kiln, or ‘noborigama’, to be built in the West. He and the pair travelled back to England together in of artists like Christopher Wood and Benjamin a fine example of an increasingly sought after pot played a pivotal