Catalogue Raisonné. The Great War Leader - Homage to Jean Paul Goude, CR625
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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The Great War Leader - Homage to Jean Paul Goude
CR 625
Scotland
2005
Oil on canvas
36 x 60 inches
Citations and Comments
Members of the Senate and House of Representatives, their faces pixelled out for security reasons, responds enthusiastically to Blair’s neo-Churchillian promise that ‘We shall stand shoulder to shoulder with you in this conflict as we have in the past’ (Twenty minute ovation). The politicians are arranged in the same way as the adulatory figures in Jean-Paul Goude’s 1982 famous photograph of Grace Jones. Behind Blair stand Cheney and Tip O’Neil. They are very pleased with the way things are going. The poodle is jumping through the flaming hoop. Enraptured Blair, on his way back to the UK, has his equilibrium upset on receiving the news of the suicide of the UK’s Chief Weapons Inspector, Dr David Kelly, who had declared that he no further wish to live in the world which was being created around him.
, 'Artist's Notes on War Paintings', unpublished manuscript, 2004Catalogue Raisonné Information
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- Gerald Laing: Iraq War Paintings, Galerie Salvador, Paris, 2005
- Gerald Laing: Iraq War Paintings, Globe Gallery, Newcastle upon Tyne, 2007
- Study for Great War Leader, 2005
- The Great War Leader (Homage to Jean-Paul Goude)