"For no good reason"

ENGLISH TRANSLATION IN ITALICS: 

Ralph Steadmans atelier har en overflade som hans tegninger. Blækklatter i rundhåndet fordeling, som set i nærblik i et interview lavet af The Economist, rundsendt af The Daily Cartoonist:

The studio of Ralph Steadman has the same surface as his drawings. Ink blots distributed lavishly, as seen up close in an interview made ​​by The Economist, circulated to us all by The Daily Cartoonist:



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6omL2ukk9c




Det absolutte højdepunkt er afsættelsen af "svirpet", som han selv kalder det. Øjeblik! Vi har en tegner, der bruger en term for sin egen teknik. Hvad han naturligvis bruger resten af interviewet på at modsige og understrege ikke at have. Han bruger pen og vådt blæk. Punktum.

For stil er noget, man opfinder, understreger han. Den er en bevidst proces, og svirpet fører os straks tilbage til midten af det 20. århundrede, hvor den unge generation eksperimenterede med tilfældets udtryk, frisat fra kunstnerens egne, fysiske proportioner og beslutninger. Det ligger lige for at nævne Yves Klein og Jackson Pollock, nu vi taler blækklatter i et brud med bevidsthedens baner.

Det siger sig selv, at tilfældets processer på forhånd har brudt med analysen og dermed også figurationen. Steadman derimod har begge dele. Vi er med andre ord i en bevidst styret teknik i med- og modspil med et temperament, hvad han folder ud i svirpet. Han ved præcis, hvad blækklatten kan i forhold til pennen. Hvor højt den placeres forenet med den skarpe bevægelse i håndleddet: Det er og bliver udtryk for den sikre mester.

Når vi nu taler bevidste processer, sætter han sig - atter som del af tilfældet - ind i 1960'ernes åbning for den rå satire. Men lad os være ærlige: Han er og bliver en af de store i traditionen fra Rowlandson, Cruikshank og Gillray fra det tidligste 1800-tals Storbritannien. De fænomenale, barske, rå om nogen i den tid, hvor Europa var brudt op af revolutioner, men hvor briterne gik udenom, og hvor tegnerne derfor blev symbolet på demokratiets frie presse, fordi alt kunne og blev diskuteret i tegningsform.

Nedenstående udfordring er af James Gillray fra 1803 til Napoleon om, hvad der vil ske inden for 48 timer, hvis han sætter fod på britisk jord. Det præsenteres i øvrigt som et portræt, og vi genkender karakteriseringen af personerne i forening med dynamikken henover billedfladen hos Steadman:

A highlight in the interview is the toss of The Flick, as he puts it. Wait a minute! We have before us a cartoonist who defines his own technique in words. Obviously, he then spends the rest of the interview contradicting precisely this. He uses pen and wet ink. Period.

Style is something you invent, he stresses. It is a conscious process, and The Flick thus takes us right back to the mid 20th century, when the young experimented in expressing an art liberated from the artist's own physical proportions and decisions. Yves Klein and Jackson Pollock spring to mind when talking of inky blots in a break with conscious structures.


Jackson Pollock, 1950

It goes without saying that the process of chance negates analysis and thus figuration. Steadman, however, has both. In other words we have before us a deliberate, controlled technique - supporting and opposing a temperament as he unfolds it in The Flick. He knows exactly what ink blobs can aspire to in conjunction with the pen. The raising of the pen combined with the sharp movement of the wrist: It is the demonstration of the true master.

When speaking of conscious processes, he places his work – calling this too a case of chance – within the readiness of 1960'ies for savage satire. But let us be honest: He is one of the great in the tradition of Rowlandson, Cruikshank and Gillray from the earliest 1800-century Britain. Those phenomenal, harsh, savage if anything, cartoonists who worked at a time when Continental Europe was disintegrating due to revolutions. Of which the British saw nothing and their cartoonists thus became the symbol of democracy in that everything could be and was discussed in the shape of cartoons.

The challenge below by James Gillray dates from 1803 and was addressed to Napoleon what would happen within 48 hours of his setting foot on British soil. It is presented as a portrait, and we recognize the characterization of the persons before us along with the dynamics across the picture plane from Steadman:

James Gillray, Buonaparte. 48 Hours after Landing! 1803.

Tegninger er til underholdning, som de er til oplysning, eller ingen af delene, med Ralph Steadmans egne ord. Verden ser værre ud nu, end da han begyndte at tegne, hvorfor hans konklusion er klar. Også denne i lige linje fra hans forgængere: Hans kunst må have gjort en forskel.

Drawings are for entertainment, or they may educate us, or maybe neither, in Ralph Steadman's own words. The world looks worse now than when he started drawing so his conclusion is clear. This too ties him directly to his savage predecessors: His art must have made a difference.