Abstract Art Defended By Auckland Authority

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28606, 7 June 1958, Page 4

Abstract Art Defended By Auckland Authority

“The Press’ Special Service

AUCKLAND, June 6. Action painting which has raised eyebrows and some blood pressures at * the Festival exhibition in the Auckland Art Gallery, is here to stay, according to the director of the gallery, Mr P. A. Tomory. He told a large audience at the gallery that the movement toward abstract art was too big to be merely ridiculed or ignored. “People who come here expecting to see idyllic landscapes and pictures of little girls stroking puppies are wasting their time.” Mr Tomory said. “Anybody who is not stimulated by any of these paintings is probably blind to visual art.” “What about the painters who ride bicycles over their canvases,” asked a woman. “It wouldn’t matter if they rode three bicycles over their canvases so long as the result was a work of art,” Mr Tomory replied. “Turner mixed one of his yellows with saliva and tobacco juice, for that matter. “Newspapers seize on the eccentricities of painters like Mathieu, who charge at the canvas from a distance of 20 feet. The eccentricities of the artist have nothing to do with the finished result. “There is an odd idea that the twentieth century has produced something extraordinary in art—a complete break with tradition. The essentials of paint and capvas are the same and the best abstract paintings are organised with as much sensitivity and technical ability as in the past.” “How can an artist who trickles paint down the canvas be said to discipline the paint,” Mr Tomory was asked. “The canvas can be tilted so that the paint trickles in a certain direction,” he replied. The barrier to understanding abstract art, he said, was the misconception that an artist was someone who went round copying nature or illustrating a literary scene. This led to admiration for works like “When Did You Last See Your Father?” which had been badly painted by a good illustrator. Painters could not be expected

to go on painting idyllic landscapes for ever, Mr Tomory said. The eye was assaulted every day by new brutalities in the shape of everything from mechanical gadgets to newspaper layout. Artists could not be denied the right to express what they felt about these new shapes. Asked about New Zealand art, Mr Tomory said some local landscapes were well painted. But the style was so familiar that they made no impact. “One cannot,” he said, “continue to be stimulated by the same bowl of breakfast food every morning.”