Something very strange has happened…
My younger sister gave me a great book for Christmas: “At work in Paris – Raymond Mason on Art and Artists”. I started reading it when I got here on the 1st Feb. As I was saying to my parents last night, I don’t know his work, but I think he should be a lot better know than he is.
Unfortunately he was not only a figurative sculptor, but also one who believed that art should be about real life and appeal to the public. His concern for content was against the fashion and flow of his time as he was working during first the modernist era with the primacy of the object and ‘how’ (not why) of art, then with pop art.
His memoirs are great – he is amusing and at times quite cutting about his contemporary artists and gallerist, then very challenging and insightful about art and artists. He was friends or aquainted with an amazing roster of artists, Giacometti, Francis Bacon Balthus, Jean Cocteau, Alexander Calder, Cartier-Bresson, Picasso, Henry Moore… he was “admired by artists whom the public admire and ignored by most critics”.*
It has been weird reading about his ideas and opinions at this influencial period for me, where I feel I’m going through a real period of growth and change in my practice. I almost feel like he has been a second mentor – not that I always agree with him, but I do respect and listen to what he has to say.
Then as we were talking last night I decided to googled him (I had already been looking up and investigating photos of his work). And there on his wikipedia entry I saw that he has just died – on the 13th February! It really shocked me, and seems strange that he should have died whilst I’ve been getting to know him. It also seems that his Obituary is just hitting the newspapers yesterday and today (in fact it is the lead Obituary in yesterdays Telegraph that my father had just brought from London – how strange is that!).
Please do look up and find out about this fascinating artist.
Raymond Mason RIP
March 2, 1922, in Birmingham, England – February 13, 2010 in Paris, France
* Telegraph Obituary: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/culture-obituaries/art-obituaries/7318726/Raymond-Mason.html
Guardian: http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2010/feb/25/raymond-mason-obituary
