julian Broadhurst’s

‘Eight Crucifixions’

at The Metropolitan Cathedral

of Christ the King Liverpool

 

 

 

 

 

         A large, non figurative, geometric piece, No. 8 in my series ‘Sacred Circles’, presented, as a gift to the Fabric of the Cathedral in Trust for the people of Liverpool, on the 24th of April 2OO3.

 

          On the 1st of May 1984, when I had just turned 17, I was on a visit with my 6th form to Liverpool University but I left to look around the Ultramodern Metropolitan Cathedral. I was Transfixed by the colour & the Architecture. The Alter piece by Ceri Richards, in his chapel of the blessed sacrament, revealed to me in that moment that  Art could be my life. I wanted someday to have a Work of mine in this building

 

Concept and the Work

 

In 2OO2 I was invited to show 7 large pieces, the ‘Liverpool Pictures’, in the Liverpool Biennale. Whilst  in  the city I visited the Wonderful Metropolitan Cathedral, one of my very favourite places. I had been working on a series of works based on the groundplan Geometry of the cathedral, called Sacred Circles and I was struck then, that I should donate one of these works to the Cathedral. I promised the ‘Cathedral House’ Manager Ms Claire Halon that I would do so. She was delighted by the Idea and we kept in consultation during the making of the piece. Later In my studio at home, the title ‘Eight Crucifixions’ came to me, as the name for the piece I needed to create. I am sure this came from a  suite for piano by he French Composer Olivier Messiaen entitled ’Vingt regards sur I’enfant-jesus’  - ‘Twenty looks at the infant Jesus’, I know I felt the pull of this title in naming the Work, before I had the least Idea of how it would look. Also, Like Andy Warhol, I believe in the power of the repeated image to ‘step up’ the contemplative power of an image. I had to invite the observer somehow to contemplate the Crucifixion, Eight times.

 

I have not, nor did I intend to represent or depict the Crucifixion in this work. It is not a rendering of it in abstracted form. Rather the ‘Language’ of my work, its syntax, is one of pure shape. Visually our time has been about this, witness this fabulous Cathedral. One analogy of this type of abstraction is Music, because  it is considerable, in and of itself. 

 

The Elemental Aesthetic

 

          My works are an exploration, of the technical possibilities of a fundamentally Geometric Art; taking as a premise, the Geometric figure as an Element, hence Elementalism, and I am then an Elementalist. My work concerns the mechanics of construction, and of the perception and deception of the eye, by the manipulation of those Given Elements. I search for the realisation of Beauty in Form, in this Elemental Aesthetic. I Call this realisation Elegance and to find it Closure. I produce these Works normally as standard sized panels, on which I print one off Enlargements of my Drawings and Montages.

 

         The ultimate content of  ‘Eight Crucifixions’ is of this Elemental Aesthetic; it is rigorously Geometric and an entirely  natural development within and from the context of my Work. As with all my Works,  I invite people to contemplate the Form, as  when we listen to music, we contemplate the Form. This work is in essence an adoration of the Cathedral. It was made for this and only this space and it reflects the Aesthetics of the Cathedral. Geometry is itself revealing of the nature of our World, in the nature of the Elements of Shape. In turn the Elements of Shape are the given of this art. The 5 pointed star, for example, has a glorious and profound Sharpness and aggression, that no other star has. It is insistent and triumphant, small wonder it is favoured by so many cultures as a National sign. It has become a very familiar compositional device in my recent work. I use it to impress rigour and certainty, and pain, perfect then for a crucifixion.

         

          The cross is by contrast a simple and natural Geometric figure and you can easily create one from this particular star. I followed  My Master Ceri Richards, in his Panel for the Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament, by nominating mine as an Altar piece. To my mind it has a spirituality, principally in that a meditation on pure shape is always a revealing, perhaps a spiritual act. However to be true to the title to which, for which it was composed, its eight obvious divisions, ‘are’ the crucifixions of its name, they contain crosses within the figures, some may call them crucifixes. If they will then let them be crucifixes. They might call the multi-layering of stars ‘Crowns of thorns.’ As an Artist I merely invite them to contemplate, multiply. If I can do that, then I have succeeded.

 

Eight Crucifixions The Work itself

 

 

          Structurally ‘Eight Crucifixions’ has the intellectual quality of being a set of variations. Not in the Classic sense of ‘Variations on a given theme’ , but as a set of variations on an Ideal Theme. The Ideal Theme in this case being a series of rules, governing the possible Transformations of the Elements, constituting the Form, of the 8 constructions within the piece. On these I deliberately placed sweeping restrictions on how, to what end, I could vary these Given Elements.  For each of the eight Groups, or Variations, I took a Montage of the Cathedral’s Ground plans, and inscribed in its Circles, its Sacred Circles, a Geometric Group or Tracery, using that tight set of Formal rules governing each constituent Element.  I Drew the right hand Set of Four variations  first, so the left hand set, had both to react to it and to follow on consistently from it, making the search for each new compositional solution harder than the last.

 

‘Eight Crucifixions - The Material Work

 

          Materially Eight Crucifixions is a printed panel about twice the size of that which I usually build. Technically it was printed on an industrial inkjet by John E. Wrights ltd of Derby;. The frame, was built from black lacquered Spanish wood, with a classically Modern Moulding, by Masterframer Darren Waldron, at the Friargate Gallery. Old friends GT Couriers brought it to the Cathedral Tuesday April 22nd. 

 

          Thursday April 24th, I arrived in Liverpool, and was warmly Greeted by Dear Sister Anthony Wilson, the Cathedral Curator, whilst two uniformed guards carried the Work around, like an honour guard, for the Daily post and myself to take our photographs. As an Artist I have never felt more Wanted or rewarded. Today I broke a Glass ceiling, I have made a tiny Mark on England.

 

julian Broadhurst - Drowningcircle.