Catalogue Raisonné. Print, CR089
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.
View all Utopian Abstract Sculpture
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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CR 089
London
July - September, 1965
Oil on aluminium and chrome on brass, irregular, hinged and boxed
17 x 6 (irregular, hinged and boxed) inches
Edition of 46
6,8,9,13,14,26,37 of 46
Citations and Comments
I had brought the prototype of my first multiple with me [to London in 1965] from New York. Although it was made of aluminium and brass sheet, I called it Print, with the deliberate and challenging intention of proposing that a multiple art object might be made of something other than paper, the medium always used in lithographs, silkscreens and etchings. Clerkenwell Green nearby, not yet gentrified, was at that time still filled with small workshops, most of which seemed to be devoted to activities associated with the manufacture of clocks. There I found a man who specialised in cutting out, from sheet metal, elaborate and decorative fingers for long case clocks. I employed him to cut out, in brass and aluminium, the basic parts for Print, which I had decided to make in an edition of 46. In the workshop next door to the clock hand maker they painted the numbers and decoration on clock faces; painting my 46 multiples was easy for them. Further down the street a small engineering shop carried out the engine turning on part of the aluminium section.
, 'Gerald Laing: An Autobiography', unpublished manuscript, 2011, ch.21Catalogue Raisonné Information
We are compiling a full record of all Gerald Laing's artworks for the publication of a full Catalogue Raisonné.
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- 1971: Gerald Laing, Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art, Edinburgh, 1971
- Gerald Laing: A Retrospective 1963–1993, The Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, 1993
- Gerald Laing: Sculpture 1968–1999, The Fine Art Society, London, 1999
- Gerald Laing: From 1963 to the Present, Bourne Fine Art, Edinburgh, 2004
- Space, Speed, Sex: Prints and Multiples 1965–1976, Sims Reed Gallery, London, 2006
- Gerald Laing: Prints and Multiples, Sims Reed Gallery, London, 2012
- The Armory Show, Lyndsey Ingram, 2019