Page 4 - Patrick Scott Scrapbooks

!PAGE TWENTY -SlX-HIBERNIA, 1961
Patrick
Ji'i those wordy arguments about painting which extreme youth once drove one to, too o ften one met those who, anxious at any cost to abuse the art which the 20th century con- strains us to produce, and aware that a fact Qlf two, a name or two, wo.uld bolste'r their arguwents no end.,sooner or later threw out a
exhibition
sentence in which the
only their teeth to grind. Nobody in fact- perhaps a
few his painting. Patrick Scott has now taken his place as a controversial painter. The remarks of Mrs. Donny- brook's litre girl (who could do, and has done, secundum. Mrs. D.. better hersel,f) are quoted with joy by the ne-wspapers: Mr. Belfast. tycoon at the pence and tyro at all e'lse. indignates at the
thought that these pence should be used to buy a r>ainting by his blood enemy. a painter.
The nat :onal art critics are
The opposite kin<l of painter, broadly speaking, is the reafot whose paintings are concerned with shapes and colours O'f bhings as generally seen, and whose forms and colours are dictated by this outward kind qf reality . Pat•rick "Scott's particular con- tribu.t:on to painting is the fact that while not an abstract
painter, his subject matter is sub- ject matter at one remove, and bears as little relation to the ex- tcrna•l seeable reality as an ab- stract paint' ng does.
Why is this? Why is his sub- ject matter, paradoxically there all right. subject matter by courtesy only? The answer is not hard to fi'nd and the due lies in the evident skill an<l judgement wibh whioh each paint- ing is accomplished, This skill has led him into some by-ways of technique. where his excep- tional'ly sure hand and eye save him from virtuosity alone. but where nevertheless the technique dictates the image an<l not, as is
usuaI. vice versa.
Thus, some canvases in
(Continu-;.d in column 4)
and having nagged at a painter who stands head and shoulders above most of the pa inters thi s country has produced, now let
word he was diverse enough to hang any label on. an enigma. but one who penetrated
th<! r dim receptivity.
In the same way in this
figured . T o them
Picasso
an a rch-type, a figure
country a few years ago, one
w a ' t h e n a m e o f L o u i s
le Brocquy to show the extent of
the information at hand , to show
that vou were talking to a fellow
who"d s('en the stu'ff, a fellow
who knew what he was talking buying a painting by Patrick
about, and to illustrate with this se-;ame name all long hairdom. all foisting upon the public, all ood. He was in fact a con(tover-
ial J>ainter, loved unc1itically and foathed uncritically by the two of uncritical people who pbyed the game of art argument from opposite sides- those with
(Continued from column 3)
exhibition at the Dawson Gal- lery have soft blobs of diffused
Scott. but at the s'ame time, buy- ing many questionab'.e works besides. In sh or t, n·obody examines his painting. Let me try to do so. '
An abstract painter is one who is taken lo be one whose paint- ings are built around and con- cerned with forms and colours
/
savagery. a few more mistakes in
this painting that tends at the
moment towards a sensual tac-
tile heiJonism, and curiously
tion is Irish artist Patrick Scott w h o s e work· is included in collections in Europe and America . . . and in Mr Huston's own collection at his hoμie in County Galway.
The trip was a bigger sacrifice bn the part of the CATCHES· film man than the artist may think. He did not even see fit to travel to the premiere of "The Misfits,"
Scott's
an axe to grind. and those with as existing in thei•r own right.
paint .on them. This is the for me the best painting me nag at you. the great public,
m.the exhibition is the least ably to go to the exhibition and bear painted, the small still life of in mind a dictum of Francisco
PREMIER·E
beginning. The next step is a
touch or two to define things a
little more clearly, and the
painting is finished. The paintino fruit. There is a.gauchiness about Bores "Painting is to be re-
with a little vi;ma1 leeway to it, an admission of difficulties lished like fruit- before all else
side or another, could be named one thing or another; and in- deed given the particular painter we are dealing with, the namino be visually correct-! One will 10 see the thing named. Hut the thing named-and this is the not bhe thing expressed.
The thing expressed is paint and canvas or whatever the medium may be. ·
This could lead to a banren aestheticism but in Patrick Scott's case it does not, for the very good reason that you have to have a hea1lthy private income and a mental skin like an ox for . such cork lined pleasures. Tt rs 10 fact the realities of the common human condition that at once beset us and save us. And it is questionable at the ,ver\l least that saved as one ·is from one's fancy by economic. gastdc and social reality, Vlnhether one does . 110! owe that reality . somd- thing of a debt. ·
One could wish for a bit more
l<:ft behind and more lying be- it is a sensuous p'.easure. We
Full house
Patrick Scott·

myself, drifted O'llt on to the landing 1n case the floor g"ave
want to really mix your cul- tural drinks, then try one hom with the Lane collection, and
1,HERE was a great attenda.nce at the opening by John Huston
the film director, of Patrick exhibition at the Dawson Gallery yesterday. They were rewarded by a most impressive speech-talk is a better word'--,on art and pa,inbin,g.
Patrick Scott is employed in the establishment of Michael Scott the architect-no relative. "But' the work I do there is anonymous," he says. He is the architect whom the Grafton street traders selected to plan the Christmas lighting a couple of years back,
Perhaps the most remarkab·le fact about this exhibition was that it opened with 12 out of the 28 paint- ings already sold. John Huston himself bought two.
Patrick Soott exhllbitlon was opened by John Huston in the ])a.W'Sl()n Gs.llery yester- day a!temoon in the presence of such a packed audience that several people, including
Leonardo da V 1n c I, and
attempted to interpret for us
all once again the mystique of
Patrick Scott (" the arch, the an hour With Patrick Scott.
all Patrick Scott's pictures had way under the weight of . been sold before the exhibition
avoirdupois, fume and d:l.stln<:- tion.
opened!
It was just as well that John Huston mentioned this, for so jammed was the audience that
John Huston, speaking with
the kind of diction and accent
that made his .remarks sound the pictures were invisible,
like an American President's message to the nation, happily mentioned Braque, Keating and
anyhow.
This exhibition
Thursday, March 9,
hind and more lying ahead, and at the same time a connection with the exlernal forces that one finds greeting one as an exten- sion of humanity itself-which is what a'11 good painting does.
But a critic is necessarily a nag,
savour it with our fingers. and its skin is identified with our own!'
Patrick Scott's pa;nting is to be savoured. particularly his present which have a warmth that he has not heretofore achieved.
SOMEONE
national prestige ,
concerned w:th
and a painter who goes to the Venice Biennale last year must necessa,rily be defended - even if ina.ppositely. Guggeniheim obs·cures the issue - further by
For really LIGHT pastry use ITREXI
ELSE'S
OHN HUSTON, fiIm
J director, master of foxhounds, art lover, and man about every- where, left the hunting field yesterday to open an exhibition of paintings in
Dublin.
He drove 150 miles for the occasion and then declared: "I would not have done it for anyone eise." Holding the exhibi-
in New York.
"Making a film is rather
like having a child," he said at the time. "The
director is the father. Once the ba.by is born1 it is much better if he keeps out of the way."
cirdle and the parallelogram"), If you can absorb the lot-I ana ended with the truly don't believ.e a word you say.
astonishing announcement that
Go on and try it out on ·your- self.
Here kl Dublin we have the best of both worlds.
I
' '
'
·]
' · your shopping list tocday. ·
F. A. Wyatt and Co.. Lid., Com111ercial Building!. Dubhn,,·j,,
COOKING FAT
-it's wonderful for trying. too. And remember, pnre •. vegeWble TREX rs much n1ore digestibk. Put TREX on' '. '
THE DO DOES NO
THE MAN
WHO MISSED
HIS OWN