Vanessa Engle's three-part series on British art in the 1960s continues with the development of sculpture during the era.
2. FROM BRONZE TO BAKED BEANS
British sculpture in the Sixties truly broke the mould. Episode two of Art & the 60s traces sculpture's progression, in just 10 years, from Henry Moore's bronzes, via Anthony Caro, to Gilbert and George serving up baked beans in ice-cream cones.
Q&A: Director/narrator Vanessa Engle answers your questions
It all kicked off in 1960 when Anthony Caro, a former assistant to Henry Moore, returned from the USA where he had met the highly influential art critic Clement Greenberg. He decided to stop making bronzes on plinths and instead create colourful abstract steel structures that would sit on the floor.
At St Martin's College, where he was a teacher, Caro, in conjunction with Phillip King, Bill Tucker, Tim Scott and Michael Bolus led the sculpture department's break with tradition. They rapidly became the new orthodoxy of abstract sculpture. Their work was collected by Alistair McAlpine who, aged 19, had inherited a fortune from the building trade and began to plough it into this radical new art.
Gallery: Highlights from the Tate Britain exhibition
Two years later a new generation of artists, such as Bruce McLean and Barry Flanaghan, arrived at St Martin's and instantly reacted against the new sculpture established there. Hamish Fulton and Richard Long started to explore whether going for a walk could be art, and Gilbert and George began their lifelong collaboration. Their early 'sculptures' included tea parties where they served up cold baked beans in ice cream cones and a performance in which they sang along to Flanagan and Allen's Underneath the Arches.
By the end of the era sculpture had changed beyond recognition.
Episode two features artists including Anthony Caro, Phillip King, William Tucker, Kenneth Noland, John Latham, Barry Flanagan, Malcolm LeGrice, Richard Long, Hamish Fulton, Bruce McLean, and Gilbert and George.
A major exhibition, Art & the 60s: This Was Tomorrow, accompanied the original broadcast of the series. It ran at Tate Britain from 30 June - 26 September 2004.
