The Churchill-Hitler seat was designed by Gerald Scarfe for Rude Britannia: British Comic Art which opened at the Tate last week and runs until 5 September. Incidentally, the cigar-smoking, Churchillian bulldog (masquerading as Winnie's frequent companion 'The Black Dog' of depression) was added later to stop unwary visitors from bumping into Adolf's zeich heiling left arm!
Of course, Tate Britain the depository of over five centuries of British art, is no stranger to rudery as can be seen from the shortlist to most Turner Prize shows. But this time it's letting its hair down and having a bit a laugh, albeit often with serious intent, over what many would categorise as ephemera - newspaper cartoons, comics, saucy postcards - interspersed with examples of modern art.
The critics have almost universally complained that there aren't enough chuckles or guffaws and maybe that's true, but the work of masters of the caricature - from Rowlandson (above), Gilray, Hogarth and Cruickshank through to Scrafe, Steadman, Steve Bell and Martin Rowson - are all proof that the pen, when dipped in the vitriolic ink of satire, can be far mightier than the sword.
What the Tate has provided is an opportunity for cartoonists (the aforementioned Scarfe and Bell together with the creators of Viz and the comedian, Harry Hill) to assist in curating an exhibition that is sometimes so disturbing that laughter is impossible as with Peter Kennard and Cat Picton Phillips' Photo-Op...
In truth, much of what is shown here is shocking, but there are also moments to have a chuckle whether it be in the pages of the Beano or in naively provocative paintings by the always delicious Beryl Cook, whose Ladies Night (right) shows a gaggle of giggling, gawping, girls enjoying a raucous night on the town.Keeping Beryl's ladies company are the cads, curates, old maids and bathing belles peopling the seaside postcards created by that master of sauciness, Donald McGill, whose work during the 1950s was regularly the subject of obscenity prosecutions in holiday resorts the length and breadth of Britain.
A Stick of Rock, Cock?The day I went to see the show, there were several distinguished visitors looking around...
Maybe it wasn't actually her, but she was certainly her 'Spitting Image'! Or, there again, perhaps it was her and that's why strange, blue, prehistoric (or, perhaps, mythological) birds of prey were circling overhead...
You can hear my full views on Rude Britannia (well, quite a few of them, anyway) when I'll be discussing the exhibition with Claudia Winkleman on BBC Radio 2's Arts Show tonight at around 11:30 pm. The programme will also feature a conversation I had with Gerald Scarfe, one of my all-time cartoon heroes, when we sat awhile on Mr Churchill and Herr Hitler...
You can hear my full views on Rude Britannia (well, quite a few of them, anyway) when I'll be discussing the exhibition with Claudia Winkleman on BBC Radio 2's Arts Show tonight at around 11:30 pm. The programme will also feature a conversation I had with Gerald Scarfe, one of my all-time cartoon heroes, when we sat awhile on Mr Churchill and Herr Hitler...
Images: Mostly © Brian Sibley and uploaded via my flickr Photostream.
8 comments:
Thanks for sharing the pictures and your thoughts - really must try and remember to listen in to you and Claudia (or failing that record it)
Nice to see a Beryl Cook Special!
I am so impressed and envious, Scarfe is one of my cartoon heroes as well and yet another artist who made me want to do that,too- I have always wanted to meet him, does he get to the states, much, or at all? He is Picasso, Marc Davis, Steadman, Steig, Arnold Roth and Kurtzman all rolled up in one- did I leave anyone out?That is a fabulous piece of functional art,he , like wine, gets so much better with age! I love his Hercules work as well!
I made the mistake of looking at the gift shop, spotting the 85 pound priced Gerald Scarfe Scarf which is really funny (and/or redundant!) , not unlike getting a Baseball Field named in my honor, it would be, Field Field- it is a freaking thing of beauty, I so wish I could afford it- someday,I'm sure, I love his Super Obama, and Evil Maggie.
Thoroughly enjoyed listening to you interviewing Gerald Scarfe - I wonder if Ian was ever a subject of one of his cartoons.
Enjoyed your chat with Claudia afterwards too. You are such a natural on the radio - you seem to be in your element. And you are a real font of knowledge.
BILL - I love the fact that someone living in America, where you have - or have had - some greatest cartoonists and caricaturists (I am a great admirer of, among others, Al Hirschfeld, David Levine and Michael Ramirez) should be an admirer of a Brit!
Incidentally, Thanks for the tip-off - I'd missed the Scarfe Scarf on the Tate's web-site: a nice (if costly) joke!
SHARON - Thanks for the compliment. I love radio! I always feel at home on it when I get the chance to get back on the airwaves; just not enough opportunities.
The show was pre-recorded this week which meant that (unlike the usual live version) it was edited. What is very interesting (at least to me) is what they chose to cut out: my description of Scarfe's drawing of Margaret Thatcher's nightmare (being awoken by the ghosts of dead sailors from the Belgrano) as well as the haunting 'Photo-Op' and McGill's 'Stick of Rock, Cock' joke that I included on the blog and an installation of an open tin of baked beans out of which - every few minutes - an erect sausage would proudly arise like Excalibur from the lake! I wonder why...
Scarfe was a huge influence on me, while getting my B.A. in Film at the University of North Texas. I remember being truly ignited by his painterly animations in The Wall, then learning of his amazing caricature work, then his Hercules designs were almost a refining of gestural design, the like I'd never seen before that time. I have always had idols in art and animation on both sides of the"pond". To only look within one's country's borders for artistic role models is doing the greatest injustice to one's inspirations.
Forgive me, BILL, that was a bit crass of me. I merely meant that the US has also thrown up some brilliant craftsmen in the sphere of caricature and graphic art and, have led the field (no pun intended) in animation.
Like you, I greatly admire Scarfe's ability to move effortlessly (and masterfully) between journalism, film and theatre.
Brian! Ha! I miscommunicated mt attitude- I took no offense at all to what you said! Many of my contemporaries, here in the states DON'T look beyond our borders, I think out of laziness, at least these days, when all the imagery the world has to offer can be had with a point and a click, they should look further than the American staples. I grew up in Texas and Hawaii, the Hawaii years are the ones responsible for both my writing and graphic style, but Texas had a lot to offer in many ways, too. Honestly, Moebius was the first "foreign" cartoonist I really read with awe and abandon, but then I learned of the great HERGE- Tintin, specifically, his brand of storytelling branded me for life. I am sad for those that are not openminded to cartoons around the world, from places other than their own, they don't know what they're missing!
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