— Swing Low, 1964.
The surface of these sculptures is explicitly non-tactile. The skin of paint which makes it more or less anonymous was also a reaction both to the craggy surfaces of the bronzes of the fifties and to the iron industrial flavour of Annesley’s first welded pieces. It was something comparable to the movement away from Abstract Expressionism going on in painting. Nevertheless the material was not unimportant. Annesley uses its taut qualities, as in ‘Jump’. In ‘X-Act’ and ‘Swing Low’ metal registers as both fluid and rigid at the same time, as it also does in the later rippling circular pieces. Annesley explained steel was ‘neutral— just stuft’ while at the same time ‘the most flexible, durable material you could use’. The material itself did not influence the form a sculpture took, though of course he knew what sort of pieces would be available.Tate
- 1960s
- Minimalism
- Whimsical
