Catalogue Raisonné. Red Icon
The Major Periods
1962 – 1965: Early Pop Paintings
As one of the original wave of Pop artists Gerald Laing produced some of the most significant works of the British Pop movement. His paintings reproduced images of popular heroes such as starlets, film stars, drag racers, astronauts and skydivers. His 1962 portrait of Brigitte Bardot is an iconic work of the period and regularly features in major Pop retrospectives alongside Lincoln Convertible from 1964, a commemoration of the assassination of JFK.
1965 – 1970: Utopian Abstract Sculpture
From 1965 Gerald Laing's painting evolved into abstract sculptures using the techniques and materials of car customisation - lacquering, spray-painting and chrome-plating on metal.
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1970 – 1973: Sculpture In The Landscape
A move from New York to the Highlands of Scotland in 1970 saw Gerald Laing's sculpture respond to the beauty, roughness and power of the surrounding landscape.
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1972 – 2010: Public Sculpture
Public sculptures include the the Bank Station Dragons; the Rugby Sculptures at Twickenham Stadium; the Cricketer at Lords; the Highland Clearances Memorial in Helmsdale, Sutherland and Axis Mundi in Edinburgh.
1973 – 1980: Galina Series
Inspired by the figurative sculpture of the First World War Artillery Memorial at Hyde Park Corner, in 1973 Gerald Laing began to model in clay and cast in bronze. The Galina Series and associated sculptures were his first works from this period.
1982 – 2007: Portrait Heads
Gerald Laing's portrait work includes heads and reliefs of Luciano Pavarotti, Andy Warhol, Paul Getty and Sam Wanamaker.
2002 – 2005: War Paintings
The Iraq war and the publication of images of torture at Abu Ghraib prison drew Gerald Laing back to painting for the first time in over three decades. The War Paintings series sees the starlets and all-American heroes of his early paintings take on new, more sinister roles.
2004 – 2011: New Paintings
Returning to the style and subject matter of his early pop art paintings, Gerald Laing's latest paintings feature media images of contemporary celebrities including Amy Winehouse and Kate Moss.
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Red Icon
Catalogue No. E20 (Appendix I: Early Pre-Pop Paintings)
1962
London
Oil on canvas
36 x 24 inches / 91 x 61 cm
Collection: Unknown
- Paintings by Shmuel Dresner and Gerald Laing, exhibition catalogue, St Martin’s Gallery, 1962
- Ian Carr, 'Gerald Laing', Newcastle Life, May
The visual allusions to medieval manuscripts and heraldry and the deliberate two-dimensional picture-space are immediately noticeable in Gerald Laing’s paintings. Though these paintings are not intended to represent palimpsests, they are more than arrangements of calligraphic forms and so the allusions are important for interpretation.
The origin of Red Icon exemplifies his attitude. The initial image which interested him was a partially obliterated Byzantine painting of a Saint. All that remained was a halo and a name in indecipherable letters, yet the painting had once been a communication of Christian faith. Red Icon points to the transience of the symbol, deriving this new icon-symbol out of the remains of the old. The medieval fragments in these paintings are the framework within which he transforms the mystical and chivalrous themes of the Dark Ages into twentieth-century parables.
Paintings by Schmuel Dresner and Gerald Laing, Robin Cormack, exhibition catalogue, St Martin's Gallery, London, 1962