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拍品專文
‘I have always been very interested in metamorphosis. Ambiguity can give the image a wide frame of reference … It creates cross-reference between something that looks like an object and that looks like an image. For me making sculpture there is always that tension between the sculpture as object and the sculpture as image’
(W. Turnbull in conversation with C. Renfrew, 6 May 1998, exhibition catalogue, William Turnbull sculpture and paintings, London, Waddington Galleries, 1998, p. 5).
The first known horse sculpture by Turnbull dates from 1946, executed while still a student at the Slade School of Art. Like the present work, it consisted primarily of two intersecting planes, one of which was punctuated by two holes that served as eyes, although it was painted bright yellow. Amanda A. Davidson describes, ‘Turnbull built plaster on top of a metal armature to make Horse, 1946. This piece forms a horse's head from a series of interlocking planes, both three-dimensional, flattened and frontal, exploring Cubist ideas of simplifying subjects to elemental shapes in a sculptural form. It was originally marked with fine lines and painted yellow; later it was cast in bronze’ (A. A. Davidson, The Sculpture of William Turnbull, Much Hadham, 2005, p. 12).
In the 1980s, after a brief hiatus in his sculptural output, Turnbull returned to the subject of the horse, conceiving a series of four in bronze (Horse 1,2,3 and 5). These equine sculptures are amongst the most celebrated and striking works from Turnbull’s later years, which saw a reprise of themes he had experimented with in the 1950s, thirty years before. The revival of his sculptural oeuvre was prompted by the major retrospective exhibition of his work that was held at the Tate Gallery, London in 1973. It proved a pivotal moment for his artistic thought. Confronted with such as large selection of his work gave Turnbull an opportunity to identify the themes and ideas he had consistently worked towards but had not always been consciously aware of.
In the Horses of the 1980s, Turnbull dispels any introduction of colour, instead turning his attention to form, space and the textures and tones of his bronze material. In Horse 5, 1988, he reduces the form of the horse to two interlocking shapes; the head a flat mask-like palette, which is interposed with two central apertures evocative of eyes, which connects to an arch of striated bronze, shaped to resemble a horse neck and mane. Simplified to the bare means, Turnbull succeeds in conjuring the essence of the horse. Turnbull explains his working method:
‘When I make horse’s heads – I have done them pretty well ever since the beginning – it’s always been with this idea of having a metaphoric quality. But also with only part of the horse represented, you didn’t feel the rest of the horse is missing. That has always fascinated me in sculpture where the part can become the whole’ (W. Turnbull in conversation with C. Renfrew, quoted in exhibition catalogue, William Turnbull Sculpture and Paintings, London, Waddington Galleries, 1998, p. 8).
His Horses can be seen, in part, to be inspired by the Classical Greek sculptures he studied while at the Slade, such as the fragmented Horse of Selene, circa 438-432 B.C., from the Parthenon and the Quadriga of the Mausoleum at Halikarnassos, 350 B.C. Although perhaps more significantly we can see the influence of non-Western art in works such as Horse 5, which resemble more closely the ancient tools used by earlier civilisations, such as the adze, a tool similar to an axe. Turnbull was fascinated by the ancient, historical and mystical and often frequented the British Museum, captivated by the carvings from Egypt, the Cyclades and Archaic Greek sculptures. This interest in the art of other civilisations, both ancient and contemporary, was supported by the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), which he joined after his return from Paris in 1950. It was intensified by his marriage to Singaporean sculptor Kim Lim in 1960 and their subsequent travel together to Japan, Cambodia, Malaysia and Singapore in 1962. Turnbull spoke of his early enthusiasm for non-Western art, citing the British Museum as a key source of inspiration, as it was for other sculptors of the day, such as Henry Moore:
‘I went a lot to the British Museum when I came to London. The British Museum has always been my museum, more than the National Gallery. I just thought it was the most extraordinary place … they are like archaeological sites. And I think I have always felt in a sense that the further back the exhibits were, the more modern they looked. I am always amazed how objects that are three thousand, four thousand or more years old can look as if they were done much more recently than things made fifty or sixty years ago. This way they can jump right through time. To be able to look at objects without hierarchy, without feeling that this one is higher, more developed than that one, this is very refreshing’ (W. Turnbull in conversation with C. Renfrew, 6 May 1998, exhibition catalogue, William Turnbull sculpture and paintings, London, Waddington Galleries, 1998, p. 7).
(W. Turnbull in conversation with C. Renfrew, 6 May 1998, exhibition catalogue, William Turnbull sculpture and paintings, London, Waddington Galleries, 1998, p. 5).
The first known horse sculpture by Turnbull dates from 1946, executed while still a student at the Slade School of Art. Like the present work, it consisted primarily of two intersecting planes, one of which was punctuated by two holes that served as eyes, although it was painted bright yellow. Amanda A. Davidson describes, ‘Turnbull built plaster on top of a metal armature to make Horse, 1946. This piece forms a horse's head from a series of interlocking planes, both three-dimensional, flattened and frontal, exploring Cubist ideas of simplifying subjects to elemental shapes in a sculptural form. It was originally marked with fine lines and painted yellow; later it was cast in bronze’ (A. A. Davidson, The Sculpture of William Turnbull, Much Hadham, 2005, p. 12).
In the 1980s, after a brief hiatus in his sculptural output, Turnbull returned to the subject of the horse, conceiving a series of four in bronze (Horse 1,2,3 and 5). These equine sculptures are amongst the most celebrated and striking works from Turnbull’s later years, which saw a reprise of themes he had experimented with in the 1950s, thirty years before. The revival of his sculptural oeuvre was prompted by the major retrospective exhibition of his work that was held at the Tate Gallery, London in 1973. It proved a pivotal moment for his artistic thought. Confronted with such as large selection of his work gave Turnbull an opportunity to identify the themes and ideas he had consistently worked towards but had not always been consciously aware of.
In the Horses of the 1980s, Turnbull dispels any introduction of colour, instead turning his attention to form, space and the textures and tones of his bronze material. In Horse 5, 1988, he reduces the form of the horse to two interlocking shapes; the head a flat mask-like palette, which is interposed with two central apertures evocative of eyes, which connects to an arch of striated bronze, shaped to resemble a horse neck and mane. Simplified to the bare means, Turnbull succeeds in conjuring the essence of the horse. Turnbull explains his working method:
‘When I make horse’s heads – I have done them pretty well ever since the beginning – it’s always been with this idea of having a metaphoric quality. But also with only part of the horse represented, you didn’t feel the rest of the horse is missing. That has always fascinated me in sculpture where the part can become the whole’ (W. Turnbull in conversation with C. Renfrew, quoted in exhibition catalogue, William Turnbull Sculpture and Paintings, London, Waddington Galleries, 1998, p. 8).
His Horses can be seen, in part, to be inspired by the Classical Greek sculptures he studied while at the Slade, such as the fragmented Horse of Selene, circa 438-432 B.C., from the Parthenon and the Quadriga of the Mausoleum at Halikarnassos, 350 B.C. Although perhaps more significantly we can see the influence of non-Western art in works such as Horse 5, which resemble more closely the ancient tools used by earlier civilisations, such as the adze, a tool similar to an axe. Turnbull was fascinated by the ancient, historical and mystical and often frequented the British Museum, captivated by the carvings from Egypt, the Cyclades and Archaic Greek sculptures. This interest in the art of other civilisations, both ancient and contemporary, was supported by the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA), which he joined after his return from Paris in 1950. It was intensified by his marriage to Singaporean sculptor Kim Lim in 1960 and their subsequent travel together to Japan, Cambodia, Malaysia and Singapore in 1962. Turnbull spoke of his early enthusiasm for non-Western art, citing the British Museum as a key source of inspiration, as it was for other sculptors of the day, such as Henry Moore:
‘I went a lot to the British Museum when I came to London. The British Museum has always been my museum, more than the National Gallery. I just thought it was the most extraordinary place … they are like archaeological sites. And I think I have always felt in a sense that the further back the exhibits were, the more modern they looked. I am always amazed how objects that are three thousand, four thousand or more years old can look as if they were done much more recently than things made fifty or sixty years ago. This way they can jump right through time. To be able to look at objects without hierarchy, without feeling that this one is higher, more developed than that one, this is very refreshing’ (W. Turnbull in conversation with C. Renfrew, 6 May 1998, exhibition catalogue, William Turnbull sculpture and paintings, London, Waddington Galleries, 1998, p. 7).