Alan Charlton
Painting Installation
I AM AN ARTIST WHO MAKES A GREY PAINTING - Alan Charlton - c.1969
Grey. Panels in shades of grey. This image comes to mind when I conjure up the work of Alan Charlton. Veteran of nearly 150 solo exhibitions since 1972 in some of the most prestigious museums and galleries in the world, the vision in his work has had a tremendous impact over the years. What is it about these paintings that attract so much attention? After all, grey is grey - neutral - it doesn't invoke landscape or particular sense of place, it has architectural and design overtones but these things do not stay with the viewer for long. However, in the more than twenty years I have been familiar with the work they never look dated and always retain a freshness and originality as though I am looking at them for the first time.
There is physicality to the work. They are concrete and impersonal and although intimately involved with every process from construction of stretchers to installation, Charlton keeps his own hand as absent as possible. The paintings are not metaphysical or even particularly contemplative ? they are just there. In individual works and in installation he searches for equilibrium; indeed a purity of content articulated through the absence of any superficial information.
Charlton has spent the last year preparing for this exhibition based on plans of the space. The artist has designed the invitation ? hold on to it as it is an artwork in itself ? and he had a precise idea of where everything would go before arriving - indeed before even painting. While his work has gone through various transformations over the years (some consistent factors include the 4.5 cm module) it is the installations that particularly interest him. Each piece of a multi panel work is carefully constructed to form a painting, each painting interacts with the others, and in turn the whole is put carefully in tune with the venue of the exhibition.
And what is my response? How am I supposed to feel? Charlton, like his co-exhibitor at Annandale, Roger Ackling, does not concern himself with our responses and no reading by the viewer holds sway over any other. There is no hierarchy and herein lies the magic of these paintings. He builds (Giacometti comes to mind here) a "container" through his oeuvre, setting the boundaries of the process with an incredible and consistent rigour so that paradoxically the work is always expanding rather than contracting. The artist has created a platform from which the responses are virtually infinite. Like Larry Bell with his cubes, it is not for Charlton to tell us how, when or what to feel. He is simply giving us the possibility of confronting ourselves, of glimpsing our own inner worlds in ways that may surprise us. The paintings are therefore experiential. They act as mirrors that we hold up to ourselves, our notions of art, the inevitable categorisations and constraining dogmas that we too often dress up as ideas that make their way into our view of art and life, and limit our potential to think and feel. The paintings may be austere, but the effect on the viewer is anything but. In the words of another writer, ?there is a directionality that combines all directions?. The works sets us free from the tyranny of our own thinking and the result is to broaden, not limit, our emotions and horizons.
I need to invoke a statement by the artist; "I WANT MY PAINTINGS TO BE: ABSTRACT, DIRECT, URBAN, BASIC, MODEST, PURE, SIMPLE, SILENT, HONEST, ABSOLUTE." Pondering the statement makes one realise that the artist?s quarry is bold indeed. There are ten criteria in the statement and any three would make for very rare paintings. The statement is an intention, ambitious, but also modest in that it is a quest ? more the projected map of a near lifelong journey. When I go back over the above list I see that Charlton has made no empty claim - the paintings are everything he says he wants them to be and go well beyond the conventional notion of painting.
It is with great pleasure that Annandale Galleries presents this first ever exhibition of the work of Alan Charlton to the Australian public. It is a dream many years in the gestation and I hope you find the works as enthralling as we do. I would like to thank the artist and his wife, artist Lesley Foxcroft, for their visit and enthusiasm for Australia. I would also like to thank David Juda and Ian Parker of Annely Juda Fine Art in London for their support in making the exhibition possible.
- Bill Gregory Sydney August 2006
Grey. Panels in shades of grey. This image comes to mind when I conjure up the work of Alan Charlton. Veteran of nearly 150 solo exhibitions since 1972 in some of the most prestigious museums and galleries in the world, the vision in his work has had a tremendous impact over the years. What is it about these paintings that attract so much attention? After all, grey is grey - neutral - it doesn't invoke landscape or particular sense of place, it has architectural and design overtones but these things do not stay with the viewer for long. However, in the more than twenty years I have been familiar with the work they never look dated and always retain a freshness and originality as though I am looking at them for the first time.
There is physicality to the work. They are concrete and impersonal and although intimately involved with every process from construction of stretchers to installation, Charlton keeps his own hand as absent as possible. The paintings are not metaphysical or even particularly contemplative ? they are just there. In individual works and in installation he searches for equilibrium; indeed a purity of content articulated through the absence of any superficial information.
Charlton has spent the last year preparing for this exhibition based on plans of the space. The artist has designed the invitation ? hold on to it as it is an artwork in itself ? and he had a precise idea of where everything would go before arriving - indeed before even painting. While his work has gone through various transformations over the years (some consistent factors include the 4.5 cm module) it is the installations that particularly interest him. Each piece of a multi panel work is carefully constructed to form a painting, each painting interacts with the others, and in turn the whole is put carefully in tune with the venue of the exhibition.
And what is my response? How am I supposed to feel? Charlton, like his co-exhibitor at Annandale, Roger Ackling, does not concern himself with our responses and no reading by the viewer holds sway over any other. There is no hierarchy and herein lies the magic of these paintings. He builds (Giacometti comes to mind here) a "container" through his oeuvre, setting the boundaries of the process with an incredible and consistent rigour so that paradoxically the work is always expanding rather than contracting. The artist has created a platform from which the responses are virtually infinite. Like Larry Bell with his cubes, it is not for Charlton to tell us how, when or what to feel. He is simply giving us the possibility of confronting ourselves, of glimpsing our own inner worlds in ways that may surprise us. The paintings are therefore experiential. They act as mirrors that we hold up to ourselves, our notions of art, the inevitable categorisations and constraining dogmas that we too often dress up as ideas that make their way into our view of art and life, and limit our potential to think and feel. The paintings may be austere, but the effect on the viewer is anything but. In the words of another writer, ?there is a directionality that combines all directions?. The works sets us free from the tyranny of our own thinking and the result is to broaden, not limit, our emotions and horizons.
I need to invoke a statement by the artist; "I WANT MY PAINTINGS TO BE: ABSTRACT, DIRECT, URBAN, BASIC, MODEST, PURE, SIMPLE, SILENT, HONEST, ABSOLUTE." Pondering the statement makes one realise that the artist?s quarry is bold indeed. There are ten criteria in the statement and any three would make for very rare paintings. The statement is an intention, ambitious, but also modest in that it is a quest ? more the projected map of a near lifelong journey. When I go back over the above list I see that Charlton has made no empty claim - the paintings are everything he says he wants them to be and go well beyond the conventional notion of painting.
It is with great pleasure that Annandale Galleries presents this first ever exhibition of the work of Alan Charlton to the Australian public. It is a dream many years in the gestation and I hope you find the works as enthralling as we do. I would like to thank the artist and his wife, artist Lesley Foxcroft, for their visit and enthusiasm for Australia. I would also like to thank David Juda and Ian Parker of Annely Juda Fine Art in London for their support in making the exhibition possible.
- Bill Gregory Sydney August 2006
I AM AN ARTIST WHO MAKES A GREY PAINTING
Grey. Panels in shades of grey. This image comes to mind when I conjure up the work of Alan Charlton. Veteran of nearly 150 solo exhibitions since 1972 in some of the most prestigious museums and galleries in the world, the vision in his work has had a tremendous impact over the years.