Art
Public Places
By SIMON HODGSON
THE second John Moores biennial exhibition, which is at the Walker Art Gallery until mid-January, raises first and foremost the question of twentieth-century patronage. I think it is clear that artists are materially better off today than they have ever been. An established painter at his prime can now command fortunes that no Medici would have dreamt of paying, so swiftly does history enmesh him, and so eagerly do investors make a master of him. And less successful men, given talent, are now able to live more comfort- ably and decently than previously. The traders in tricks, the signature painters, the chic who want to shock also do as well as, and probably better than, men who know how to draw and are com- mitted wholly to the life of an artist, but at least investment buying of impressionist and later works has made painting a profession where even the most philistine and gross of employers expects to pay something like a proper wage. That is the point. 'The labourer is' or is not 'worthy of his hire.' Gainsborough, bless him, described himself as a tradesman, and the patron employs the painter. The painter is an irritating, intransigent creature amenable to criticism and help, but never amenable to instruction. But the patron must have some sympathy with his chosen artist, and in the end understanding is achieved through two minds and temperaments sensing the values and virtues of each other, Now the patron . . .
The patron is by definition one man, and a painter is lucky today if an individual or a gallery owner is prepared to fulfil the role. We still live, thank God, in this country at least, in the com- mittee age, the jury age, the (less attractively) conformist age. The many are still (nominally) agin, the few (also nominally) for, whatever is new. But really, the reason that abstract painting is now universally acceptable is that everyone knows that a committee decision has been made in favour. A committee of rich investors first, then a committee'of critics and scholars and curators have made the public feel safe with non-figurative works. In this year's exhibition at Liverpool the emphasis has shown a very marked swing away from representation, and the jury headed by Professor Newton has given the prizes mainly to non-figurative works. Now the money will be very nice for Messrs. Scott, Lanyon, Philipson, Hilton, Richards, and for Miss Redpath, and what follows in no possible way suggests that they will paint in future with an eye on prize money. The trouble with such lavish generosity as that of Mr. Moores is that the active involvement of the patron in the career of an artist is missing. The
system tends to become ludicrously top-heavy when the act of patronage involves the Liverpool City Council, the French Ambassador (referred to throughout the junketings as M. Cheval), five jurors, a public-relations firm, and Mr. Moores.
For instance, there was an air of Founder's Day about the prize-giving. After dinner, speeches, in- cluding a splendidly sensible one by Alderman Braddock incidentally; after speeches the head- master, Mr. Moores, gave the prizes. 'Scott, first prize, a cheque for five hundred pounds,' and so on down the list. This is indecent because the painters had no place there, going cap in hand to collect a cheque, however deserved and however generous, before two hundred or so sated Lan- castrians, a baker's dozen of art critics, and a genial public-relations man, a usurer in reputa- tions for all his kindness. The painters should have been in their studios, or having a good dinner with Mr. Moores. The public apparatus was nonsensical, and in its way genuinely appalling.
If an artist, say Mr. Pasmore who has a large work at Liverpool, decides in the quiet of his studio to work in an entirely individual way, and if this way catches the imagination of a rich man, the rich man might well treat him as a rare, an adult, a valuable person, who should not be exposed to the vulgarities of jury life. But if a prize is to be given (and it's a wide-ranging if uneven collection at Liverpool—well worth a journey from St. Ives), then one man had better make the decisions. So come on, Moores, you like pictures, it's your money, make your own pick! What would you choose in the new French sec- tion'? Two painters from M. Massol's stable previously mentioned in these columns show well;, Jean Cartot with a careful grey near-abstract, and Jacques Germain with a dazzling roof-scape. Debra and Castro, the latter seen some months ago at Matthiesen's, and not at his best here, are well worth seeing in any miscellany. The prize- winning mosaic bird of Rebeyrolle is perhaps a disappointment; it is almost too pretty and too busy, as they say about wallpapers; it suggests too much a drawing-room de Stael.
Among the English majority, no one can deny the authority of Mr. Scott's dark blue extension of fact, or the vivid and compulsive fascination of Mr. Hilton's Yellow, April, 1959. There is too little room to discuss an exhibition of this size, in detail, or to do more than mention the Venetian richness and the languor of Mr. Greaves's Lovers, the Inlander and the Gear, or the paintings by Mr. Terry McGlynn, and Mr. Christopher Bourne. It must be enough to say that when the launching was done it was wonderful to find them so assured and so inventive in the black splendour of central Liverpool.
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