EXHIBITIONS
Eduardo Paolozzi
General Dynamic F.U.N.
16.02.11 - 11.03.11
The Holden Gallery presents a new Hayward Touring Exhibition of screen-prints by Eduardo Paolozzi. It opens with a preview showing on Tuesday 15th February from 5 – 7 pm.
The works, which make up the exhibition General Dynamic F.U.N., demonstrate Eduardo Paolozzi's preoccupation with science, technology and popular culture. Fifty screen-prints and photolithographs created between 1965 and 1970 demonstrate the artist's pursuit of a connection between art and the applied sciences. The source materials were taken from his own eclectic archive, this drew on: pulp fiction, American magazines, consumer advertising, technical manuals, science fiction and philosophical texts. The use of everyday materials positioned Paolozzi's work within the 'pop' context of their time, whilst the approach still has strong connections to much contemporary work. The novelist J.G. Ballard described General Dynamic F.U.N. as a 'unique guidebook to the electric garden of our minds'.
Paolozzi's experiments extended to collages of images and words from a diverse range of sources. The juxtaposition of popular objects highlighted their existence by presenting them in a new environment. This appears in both the work and titles such as: 'Cary Grant as a male war bride'; 'Totems and Taboos of the Nine-to-Five Day' and 'Twenty Traumatic Twinges'.
Eduardo Paolozzi was a key figure of post-war British art, a founder of the influential Independent Group and his work was also important in the development of the pop art movement. He remained true to the method of assemblage of everyday objects and this was visibly apparent in his technique. The work makes use of familiar figures from consumer advertising, high fashion and Hollywood to the morphology of 20th century culture. Paolozzi was keen to develop an archive, one which would serve in the analysis of popular culture through exhibitions and research. General Dynamic F.U.N. could be seen as part of that legacy.
There will also be a one-day conference Eduardo Paolozzi: Re-readings on Friday 18th February 2011 at Manchester Metropolitan University, coinciding with the exhibition.
