Jim Whiting's Mechanical Extravaganza

Curated and organised by Mead Gallery
Sat 24 Nov – Sat 8 Dec 1990

Jim Whiting first came to prominence in 1979 when his ‘Business Machine’ took the Hayward Gallery by storm with its Heath Robinson style mechanical structure which launched dummy figures of business executives at high speed around the Gallery. The figures included Dive Bombing Executives, Fidgeting Men and Salesmen banging their heads together in an hilarious, zany and demonic parody of business life today. Since the Hayward Show, Jim Whiting has exhibited his machines only occasionally in this country. For the Mead Gallery he is creating a new and amazing fantasy.

Gerrit Rietveld: Furniture and the House for Mrs Schroder

A Southbank Centre Touring Exhibition
Sat 20 October – Sat 8 Dec 1990

The Rietveld Schroder House in Utrecht was the first open-plan house, the prototype for many. Rietveld, a member of the art garde Dutch De Stijl Group was a furniture maker who had never built a house when Mrs. Schroder commissioned hers in 1924. She aimed to show that living in the twentieth century was different to living in the nineteenth century and the house has long been an icon of the modern movement. Mrs Schroder lived there until her death in 1985 at the age of 95.

The exhibition will explore the house through models, drawings, audio visual and a part reconstruction and there will be a display of all the classic examples of Rietveld furniture including the Red Blue Chair.

The Tree of Life: New Images of an Ancient Symbol

A Southbank Centre Touring Exhibition in association with Common Ground
Sat 6 Oct – Sat 10 Nov 1990

Over 100 artists responded to the open submission competition run by Common Ground to celebrate a contemporary expression of the age old and universal symbol of the tree. The final selection is a stimulating group of work by twenty artists, sculptors, printmakers and photographers.

Marina Warner and Oliver Rackham have written for the exhibition catalogue and an audio visual programme explores the image of the tree in the religions of the world.

Art from South Africa

Organised by the Museum of Modern Art, Oxford in association with the Zabalaza Festival
Sat 6 Oct – Sat 10 Nov 1990

An exhibition of painting, sculpture, linocuts, craft work, poster images and banners by black and white South African artists. The differences in experience and training are reflected in the contrasts of available materials: natural resources in rural areas and industrial waste in urban centres. While these differences create a diversity of expression and response, the exhibition embodies the South African experience of working to establish a wholly democratic society of equals.

Henry Moore: The Small Sculptures

An Arts Council Touring Exhibition from the Southbank Centre
Sat 12 May – Sat 23 Jun 1990

Many of the 40 hand-sized bronzes on display in this exhibition were made by Henry Moore as preliminary works to some of his large scale sculptures. They are all, however, works of art in their own right. The exhibition traces such recurring subjects in Moore’s long working life as the mother and child, the reclining figure and the fallen warrior.

Thomas Lowinsky

Organised by the Tate Gallery; an Arts Council Touring Exhibition from the Southbank Centre
Mon 23 April – Sat 2 June 1990

Thomas Lowinsky worked as a painter of imaginative scenes in the English Surreal manner, as in the The Breeze at Morn (1930) now in the Tate Gallery collection. He also worked as an illustrator and created the images for Edith Sitwell’s Elegy on Dead Fashion and a number of other classics. The paintings, which will form the major part of this exhibition, will be shown together with examples of his illustrations and textile and wallpaper designs.

Tom Phillips: The Portrait Works

Organised and toured by the National Portrait Gallery
Thu 8 Feb – Sat 10 Mar 1990

It is only recently that Tom Phillips has painted to commission and his sitters have included Iris Murdoch and Sir Claus Moser. The idea of a retrospective exhibition has inspired the artist to produce many new portraits which are presented in the context of his overall development.

The University of Warwick has recently commissioned a portrait of its first Chancellor, Lord Scarman, on his retirement and this portrait will be seen for the first time in the exhibition at the Mead Gallery.

Michael Rothenstein: Painter and Printmaker

Exhibition organised and toured by Stoke on Trent Museum and Art Gallery
Mon 22 Jan – Sat 10 Mar 1990

This retrospective exhibition examines he development of the work of Michael Rothenstein. As Rothenstein remarked, “The artist doesn’t live by establishing a style and by practising that style all his life” and his work is witness to constant stylistic change.

Posada: Messenger of Mortality

An Arts Council Touring Exhibition from the Southbank Centre
Sat 20 Jan – Wed 24 Feb 1990

Many of Posada’s most notable prints were inspired by the festival, The Day of the Dead. Posada utilised motifs such as the skeleton, to comment on the immense political upheavals of the period and on aspects of contemporary Mexican life. The prints were reproduced in popular newspapers, magazines and broadsheets.

The work of Jose Guadalupe Posada (1852-1913) has influenced artists such as Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco and the French Surrealists.