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Masters of War Published by Faine Contemporary Art 2016 5 Mono-prints in different colour ways with gloss over print varnish and diamond dusted bombs
MASTERS OF WAR. Like many children born at the end of the second world war my friends and I found the bomb sites and craters that were still unrepaired in the early fifties, a source of exciting landscapes in which to play. One day we would be British soldiers fighting the Gestarpo using crudely shaped sticks as machine guns. The next we were knights with wooden swords and badly painted cardboard shields jousting with the Sherrif of Nottingham's men at arms, while talking of deeds of honour inspired by the films we may have watched at the Saturday mornings ABC minors movies. The determination as to who should be The Lone Ranger, Sir Lancelot, Geronimo or Tarzan was usually accompanied by cuts and bruises as we fought for the right to become the hero of the latest film. This fascination with the cinema stayed with most of us until pubity, when the local Cinema took on a new role when its back seats provided a dark space of furtive romances. But then we all grew up, lost contact and went our separate ways. I still wonder how many of us remember the lessons we learned from the movies about the significance of cowboys in black or white hats, the dignity of officers with stiff upper lips, or those romantics like Don Quixote who continued tirelessly to tilt at windmills, while still seeking the Grail. |
Canvases from 2016
