Catalogue Raisonné. Love Machine, CR[none given]
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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Love Machine
CR [none given]
1962
Mixed media
17 x 10 x 23 inches
Citations and Comments
Ernest Gombrich’s book Ways of Seeing had just been published and, as a result, those of us who had read it were very conscious of optical effects, illusions and anomalies. At Pollock’s Toy Museum, there were examples of nineteenth century optical toys, some of which produced images which appeared to move. Depending as they did on the persistence of the image on the retina of the eye, they were early precursors of the movies. I asked about them at the V&A and was shown the ‘toy box’ in the Print Room at the Museum, which contains Victorian printed paper and cardboard toys and novelties, many of which demonstrate these optical principles. Using an interrupter disk, I made over the next few years a series of constructions which I called ‘Love Machines’, in which I combined an optically changing image with my taste for elaborate and highly finished machinery.
, Gerald Laing: An Autobiography, unpublished manuscript, 2011, ch.12Catalogue Raisonné Information
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- Gerald Laing: Exhibition of Paintings and Drawings, Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, 1963