![\"Bernard](\"http:\/\/bernardvanlierop.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/Solzhenitsyn-779x1024.jpg\")
<\/a>‘Mask of Solzhenitsyn’ (1974) Height 75 cms (29.5 ins) Slate-filled GRP<\/p><\/div>\n
Within four or five years I was casting sculpture which was quite large in scale, including this ‘Mask of Solzhenitsyn’. I hope one day to find a buyer, perhaps a school of Slavonic Studies, who might be able to pay for it to be cast in bronze and give it a long-term home.<\/p>\n
I was fortunate to have my work sponsored for a couple of years by Knowles Foundry, in Willenhall, near where we lived in Wolverhampton. The foundry was\u00a0managed by a\u00a0Mr Brian Jackson who generously\u00a0put me under the care of his senior sand-moulding\u00a0craftsmen who taught me to\u00a0sand-cast.\u00a0I was\u00a0allowed to produce a number of aluminium castings, mostly from\u00a0my ‘Birth and Family’ sequence.<\/p>\n
![\"Bernard](\"http:\/\/bernardvanlierop.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/06\/babyBREAST-1024x787.jpg\")
<\/a>Breast-feeding Relief no. 1 (1976) Aluminium 15 x 20 cms (5.75 x 7.75 ins)<\/p><\/div>\n
Over this decade several themes emerged which were to remain important to me, including photographic sequences about time,\u00a0both\u00a0in buildings and\u00a0in\u00a0seasonal changes, where\u00a0my love of Caspar David Friedrich first\u00a0emerged in my art practice.<\/p>\n
Another theme of this decade was ‘Intensive\u00a0Self Tuition in\u00a0Figure Drawing’. This was\u00a0part of\u00a0a (still unrealised)\u00a0plan\u00a0to\u00a0revive\u00a0History Painting, reflecting my long-standing interest in the link between Literature and the Visual Arts.<\/p>\n
These projects in figurative art were consciously\u00a0in reaction against\u00a0what I felt was the narrow-minded ‘tyranny of the avant-guarde’ in the 70’s,\u00a0for example\u00a0in the writings of the Guardian art critic Caroline Tisdall.<\/p>\n
Towards the end of this decade,\u00a0I shared a two-man show with painter and performance artist Simon Britton at Wolverhampton Art Gallery,\u00a0in\u00a0an exhibition that\u00a0gathered together work of the previous five years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This decade was a particularly productive period for me, when I tried to catch up on the practical skills that I had failed to develop earlier, following my decision to go to University rather than Art School. I played ‘catch-up’ … Continue reading