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Time of Day : Trevor Sutton at the Eagle Gallery
10 Sep – 9 Oct 2015
A review by Laurence Noga
©Copyright Patrick Morrissey and Clive Hancock All rights reserved.
“All these years later many of these early concerns have resurfaced….the grid, the
colour field, a minimalist sensibility”
Trevor Sutton
Grids are powerful structures in our lives; they bring a formal implication to the
reading of a landscape or a place, opening up a phenomenology that we have buried
in the layers of our memory. The memory of a place, its implications, the passing
of time spent observing its events, and the thoughts that occur, run parallel to
the structure of the everyday.
Trevor Sutton’s current work at the Eagle Gallery is insistent and spellbinding -
the work looks fresh and has a finely-tuned temporal mobility. That specificity of
atmosphere is partly due to a sense of place, as the works on paper were made over
a period of time spent by Sutton at a residency in the west of Ireland (County Mayo).
Equally important are the studio rituals and rules that synthesize his approach (mutability/
geometry /an empirical system). This combination builds a tension, and the illusion
of a deep surface structure within the paintings. But, critically, Time of Day revives
the intensity first seen in Sutton’s grid paintings in the 1970s.
Golden Morning, 2014 oil and pencil on board 94 x 127cm
Sutton was then producing paintings such as I.R.W. and I.R.S. These are works in
acrylic and pencil on paper, pared down to a non-colour space, temporally and spatially
distorted. Although flat, they have the feeling of reliefs, perhaps reflecting the
series Counter Rhythms and Levels by Gillian Wise, in which she develops a regenerative
quality. Sutton’s other series from that time uses angled two-colour combinations,
the colours bringing to mind the barely-distinguishable, mysterious hues of Ad Reinhardt.
The early work has a proportional interdependence, which is key to the larger diptychs
in this show. Golden Morning and Daylight Devotion seem to exude both solitude and
sociability. Each colour segment is considered, both works are very closely toned
and bring into focus the central line between the panels (as does the body of the
work in this show).The colour field in the right-hand panel fuses with the scaffolding
in the left hand, locking us into the spatial matrix and the exactness of the proportions,
moving the work towards a sense of corporeality. The decisions of the painter are
complex, and suggest a controlled cycle, with traces of nostalgia. Sutton’s ‘tuning-into’
the artists he admires, such as James Hugonin and Roger Ackling, feels like a presence
supporting his decisions and his innovation.
In the smaller works, on board, Sutton uses his perception of interior architectural
spaces - particularly Japanese. In these memory-images he creates the sense of a
relationship between the systematic (not systems) and the intrinsic meaning. Here
the 70s works re-emerge in terms of the line and the pencil pressure itself. The
action again unfolds from the centre, in terms of the surface structure and the individuality
of the colour. The acidity in Summer Wind hints at the language of nature, but is
also sensory, in terms of the sweep of oil colour that sinks and oscillates across
the surface.
Irish Shadow, 3 2015 oil and pencil on paper 51 x 51cm
In Irish Shadow the eye takes time to adjust to the look of the surface and the quality
of the ambient sound. The all-over grid structure is widened in places to open a
window into the deeper space beyond, in a dissipative moment. Irish Shadow (night)
also suggests a greater sense of improvisation within the colour segmentation, unified
by the inlay of sound and a sense of collective history, sharpening our responses.
This show is a defining moment for Sutton; he seems to be ‘locking in’ his past,
as his current work collides with memory of earlier times. These paintings’ haunted
quality stays with you, merging past observations with this totally new experience.
Laurence Noga, Oct 2015
Irish Shadow - Night, 2015 oil and pencil on paper 35.5 x 61cm
May 2, 2015 oil and pencil on board 20 x 30.5cm
I.R.W. 1977, acrylic-pencil-paper
Daylight Devotion, 2015 oil and pencil on board 94 x 127cm
May 2 feels closest to the 70s works (Arlington House 1977). It has a feeling of
John Cage and his early minimalist compositions. The washed-out non-colour on the
right-hand panel again fastens one’s sense of an emotionally-perceived image, with
its situation and mood meticulously recorded. Sutton has a wonderful facility with
elusive colour, true to the materiality of his paint, and with an almost weightless
fluidity in its layering and opacity, juxtaposed with the Ellsworth Kelly flatness
- which has depth.