PAINTER VICTOR PASMORE
LINEAR DEVELOPMENT 1970
LINEAR DEVELOPMENT 1970
LINEAR DEVELOPMENT 1970
UNTITLED 1988 SCREENPRINT
BEYOND THE EYE 1 – 1995 LITHOGRAPH
BIRTHDAY 1 – 1998 ETCHING & AQUATINT
BIRTHDAY 3 – 1998 ETCHING & AQUATINT
THE CLOUD 1986
BROWN IMAGE 1974 - ETCHING & AQUATINT
TRANSFORMATION 1 – 1970
II LABIRINTO DELLA PSICHE 1986
BROWN SYMPHONY 1974
II RISVEGLIO DELLA PSICHE 1982
TRANSFORMATION 2 - 1970
UNTITLED 1990
BY WHAT MEANS CAN WE KNOW 1974
A TRUE FULL BIRDS 2 - 1979
APOLLO 2 - 1985 SCREENPRINT
LINEAR DEVELOPMENT 1970
LINEAR DEVELOPMENT 1970
LINEAR DEVELOPMENT 1970
LA GROTTA DI CALIPSO 1978
BLUE MOVEMENT & GREEN 1980
HEAR THE SOUND 1974
NO TITLED 1971
POINTS OF CONTACT NO: 26 - 1974
SQUARE
THE STARRY NIGHT 1986 - 1987
UNTITLED 1990
TITLE NOT KNOWN 1979
TITLE NOT KNOWN 1979
THREE IMAGES 1975
UNTITLED
VIGNA ANTONINIANA 1980
APOLLO 1 ASCENDING DEVELOPMENT 1969
THE TURNING WORLD 1996
VICTOR PASMORE’S BOOKS
VICTOR PASMORE
CHANGING THE PROCESS OF PAINTING
Victor Pasmore (1900–1998) has a
unique place in the history of twentieth century British art, for not only was
he one of the most talented figurative painters of his generation, but he also
became a leading practitioner and theorist of abstract art. During his long and
fertile career Pasmore pursued many different lines of enquiry in his work. He
moved from realism to abstraction, from traditional art practices to painted
collage and construction. It was through these transformations that he began to
change ‘the process of painting’, and the works in this display chart his
progress, from the 1920s to the 1990s.
Despite showing
exceptional artistic talent in his youth, Victor Pasmore did not take the
conventional route through art school, but worked as a clerk at the London
County Council, attending evening classes at the Central School of Art. A
‘weekend painter with no academic training’ he eased his way into the London
art scene in the 1930s, showing with the London Group and the London Artists’
Association. The artistic influences that shaped his early work reflect the
spirit of the time. His admiration for the paintings of Turner inspired his earliest landscape
paintings, whilst the work of the French Impressionists influenced the oil
sketches of the countryside at Farleigh, and still lifes such as The
Bradman Still Life 1926.
Pasmore briefly
experimented with abstract painting in the mid-1930s but, frustrated by the
results, he resolved to ‘start again’, keeping to a very objective form of
representation. This led him to co-found the Euston Road School with fellow
artists William Coldstream and Claude
Rogers. The School emphasised working directly from nature, using a
disciplined, objective approach; its prospectus stated that: ‘particular
emphasis will be laid on training the observation. No attempt, however, will be
made to improvise a style’. Pasmore drew inspiration from W.R. Sickert’s urban Impressionism, and Parisian Café1936–7
exemplifies this.
In his life and work,
Victor Pasmore changed direction a great many times. His appetite for new ideas
and experiences was inexhaustible, and, as this display has demonstrated, he
continued to explore different techniques in paint and print long after he
first turned to abstraction. When he looked back on his career Pasmore said
that he felt he had witnessed the ‘revolution of Painting … (when) the
naturalist painter has been forced to start completely again’. Pasmore played a
major part in this new beginning, and his work reflected and frequently
anticipated the changes which occurred in art and art practice in the twentieth
century. It is now irrefutable that Victor Pasmore has left an extremely rich
legacy for British art. His work, in all its diversity, will remain challenging
and relevant for future generations.
Quoted from Tate
Liverpool Exhibition press releas.
