Printmaking and the Language of Violence
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PRINTMAKING AND THE LANGUAGE OF VIOLENCE by Yvonne Rees-Pagh Graduate Diploma of Arts (Visual Arts) Monash University Master Of Visual Arts Monash University Master of Fine Arts University of Tasmania Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of Tasmania MARCH 2013 This thesis contains no material which has been accepted for a degree or diploma by the University or any other institution, except by way of background information and duly acknowledged in the thesis, and to the best of my knowledge and belief no material previously published or written by another person except where due acknowledgement is made in the text of the thesis, nor does the thesis contain any material that infringes copyright. YVONNE REES-PAGH MARCH 2013 i This thesis may be made available for loan and limited copying and communication in accordance with the Copyright Act 1968. YVONNE REES-PAGH MARCH 2013 ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to acknowledge and thank my supervisors Milan Milojevic and Dr Llewellyn Negrin for their advice, assistance and support throughout the project. I am eternally grateful to my partner in life Bevan for his patience and encouragement throughout the project, and care when I needed it most. DEDICATION I dedicate this project to the memory of my dearest friend Olga Vlasova, the late Curator of Prints, Russian Museum, St Petersburg. Printmaking brought us together in a lasting friendship that began in Tomsk, Siberia in 1990. iii CONTENTS Abstract ............................................................................................. 01 Introduction ....................................................................................... 02 Chapter One: The Central Argument Towards violence ..................................................................... 07 Violence and the power of etching ........................................... 10 The Cronulla riots .................................................................... 20 Socio-political printmaking in Australia .................................... 27 Chapter Two: The Context of the Project: Related Art Practices Preamble .................................................................................. 40 Leon Golub ………………………………. .................................. 41 Nancy Spero ……………………………………….. .................... 55 Sandow Birk: The depravities of war……………………………. 63 William Kentridge: Under pressure in South Africa .................. 70 Diane Victor …………………………….. .................................... 75 Jake and Dinos Chapman ....................................................... 79 Summary ................................................................................. 84 Chapter Three: How the Investigation was Pursued Towards my own work ............................................................. 85 Development of the work for the project ................................... 85 Experimentation with liquid rosin and sugar lift etching ............ 88 Experimentation with gunpowder on paper ............................... 92 Exploding powdered rosin ....................................................... 95 Violent mark making on etching plates .................................... 92 Australian street violence ........................................................ 99 The Cronulla riots and the figurative ........................................ 103 Towards the final work ............................................................ 108 The final work ........................................................................... 109 The exhibition ........................................................................... 116 Conclusion ........................................................................................ 118 Appendices Bibliography .................................................................................................121 List of illustrations .................................................................... 131 Curriculum vitae ...................................................................... 137 iv ABSTRACT The aim of the project is to demonstrate that the traditional processes of printmaking, in particular etching, are relevant as a medium for artistic engagement with the subject of violence. My research investigates how printmaking has developed its own unique visual language as a means of addressing violence in our society, and specifically how artists have depicted violence using the medium of printmaking. To provide a context for my own practice, I examine artists from the past such as Jacques Callot, Francisco Goya, Käthe Kollwitz, Otto Dix and Pablo Picasso, all of whom engaged with the medium of etching to convey violence, as well as the work of contemporary artists Leon Golub, Nancy Spero, William Kentridge, Diane Victor, Sandow Birk, and Jake and Dinos Chapman which addresses issues such as war, social unrest and abuse of political power. The tradition of socio-political printmaking in Australia is also briefly examined, revealing a relative lack of contemporary artists in this field dealing with the theme of violence. This research informed the directions for my own work. My own work began by addressing global violence issues. Experimentation with unconventional materials and processes formed an integral part of the journey. The resultant effects from this experimentation were layered into and became part of the work. The focus of my final work is on social violence in Australia, in particular the Cronulla riots of 2005. Thousands of people were involved in these riots, making them the largest racially motivated riots in Australian history. The major work, The Cronulla Riot, is a large etching completely covering the gallery wall. My intention is to emphasise the chaos of the riot, imparted through the layers of figurative imagery, imbuing a sense of time. The scale of the work enables the viewer to feel immersed in the violence. The work challenges traditional printmaking boundaries by virtue of scale, methodology and subject matter. The power of etching, using a painstaking autographic process, has given new life to the theme of violence; an issue not explored in the medium in relation to the Cronulla riots by any other contemporary Australian artist. The core technology of etching may be ancient, but it continues to present the contemporary artist with a powerful and dynamic medium for personal artistic expression. 1 INTRODUCTION As an artist I have always been concerned with producing work that reflects my feelings in relation to events that shape our world. In the past my work has explored themes such as war, political upheaval and ecological issues. On reflection, I can identify that there has been a violence undercurrent running through many of these works; not only in their subject matter but also in the way I have used my materials. 1. Yvonne Rees-Pagh. Unknowable Land. 1989. 2. Yvonne Rees-Pagh. Crowd Scene. Oil on canvas, 90 x 140 cm. 1993. Oil on canvas, 175 x 165 cm. In my painting [1-5], I have always physically connected with and immersed myself in the process of making, a desire formed early in my art training when I was introduced to the working methods of the Abstract Expressionists. I was immediately emotionally attracted to these methods. My painting process employs layers of expressionist mark making in conjunction with extreme physical actions that disrupt the surface of the paint, such as erasing, scraping, and gouging. 3. Yvonne Rees-Pagh. 4. Yvonne Rees-Pagh. 5. Yvonne Rees-Pagh. Battlefield of Love. 1992. The Spectator. 1992. Acid Rain. 1992. Mixed media, 107 x 75 cm. Mixed media, 107 x 75 cm. Mixed media, 107 x 75 cm. 2 This approach to painting has directly influenced my printmaking [6, 7] in which I have always employed and strived to use unconventional processes and materials, towards creating prints that possess a tactile and evocative feel. In contrast to traditional printmaking, my works are unique state prints; they are not editioned. Most are multiple panel assemblages, envisaged as a unified whole. 6. Yvonne Rees-Pagh. I Saw X and X Is Human. 7. Yvonne Rees-Pagh. Wail of the Feegee. 2007. 2003. Collagraph, etching, 225 x 180 cm. Etching, silkscreen, 120 x 160 cm. My project was given initial direction by a visit to the Museum of Political History1 in St Petersburg [8] which houses a huge collection of Soviet propaganda art, memorabilia and photography. 8. Museum of Political History, 9. Museum of Political History, St Petersburg: St Petersburg, Russian Federation. Propaganda posters. My eyes were immediately drawn to the propaganda posters [9, 11]. Composed using images of faces, aggressive body gestures and accusatory slogans, these posters are graphically powerful, exciting, insightful, and contextually disturbing. Printed using traditional printmaking methods, they are eye catching through their use of bold and intense colours. 1 The Museum of Political History at 4 Ulitsa Ksheshinskaya, St Petersburg, Russia was in previous times the headquarters of the Bolsheviks, and the place where Lenin often gave speeches from the balcony. I visited the museum in October 2007 around the time of commencement of my project research. 3 10. Museum of Political History , St Petersburg: 11. Museum of Political History, St Petersburg: Tabloid stage set. Political posters. Also included were strange displays promoting the good life in the Soviet Union; tabloid staged sets of objects [10], memorabilia, propaganda and dressed