{"id":35969,"date":"2019-09-03T09:40:48","date_gmt":"2019-09-03T13:40:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/?p=35969"},"modified":"2019-09-03T09:40:55","modified_gmt":"2019-09-03T13:40:55","slug":"a-contrary-view-of-gysins-calligraphies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/2019\/09\/a-contrary-view-of-gysins-calligraphies.html","title":{"rendered":"A Contrary View of Gysin’s Calligraphies"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A painter I know had this to say about Brion Gysin’s work as an artist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pleasantly surprised by <\/em> his watercolour<\/em><\/a>. First thought was an early Yves Tanguy, whom I admire very much. But the <\/em>calligraphies<\/em><\/a> \u2014those 3-by-2-meter jobs\u2014 are outwitted any time by one little Michaux. That doesn’t invalidate the man\u2019s effort, but I see too much repetitive strain there. Gysin\u2019s calligraphies are paintings and, as such, can and should be viewed within a comparative context. There is of course Andr\u00e9 Masson to begin with\u2014right up to Lee Krasner.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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Henri Michaux: ‘untitled’ (1960) ink on paper 74.5 x 107.8 cm<\/em>.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Andr\u00e9 Masson: ‘l’amour’ (1939)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Lee Krasner: ‘Assault on the Solar Plexis’ (1961)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

What is interesting though is the hiatus between Gysin’s Sahara Dante watercolour, which is an excellent piece of work, and the large calligraphies series. It would be interesting to have a look at the work in between\u2014if there is such\u2014it would give us an idea of the continuity in Gysin\u2019s work as a painter. <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Personally, I love Gysin’s calligraphies. I don’t see \u201crepetitive strain\u201d in them. Repetitive, yes. But I like the repetitions. By “strain” I suppose he means that they became a stylistic habit. Well, tant pis.<\/em> \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For easy reference:<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
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Brion Gysin:<\/em> \u2018Untitled\u2019 (1960). Calligraphy ink on paper, mounted on canvas, 192 x 282 cm.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
\u2018Dante in the Tasile,\u2019 watercolor by Brion Gysin (1950)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A painter I know had this to say about Brion Gysin’s
\nwork as an artist. “Pleasantly surprised by his watercolour. First thought was an early Yves Tanguy, whom I admire very much. But the calligraphies are outwitted any time by one little Michaux. That doesn’t invalidate the man\u2019s effort, but I see too much repetitive strain there. Gysin\u2019s calligraphies are paintings and, as such, can and should be viewed within a comparative context. There is of course Andr\u00e9 Masson to begin with\u2014right up to Lee Krasner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":35968,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[19,4,23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-35969","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-art","8":"category-main","9":"category-news","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/henri-michaux-untitled-1960-inkonpaper-74.5x107.8-cm750-USE.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbvgEs-9m9","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=35969"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35969\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36029,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35969\/revisions\/36029"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}