Westbrook Gallery

Brian Rice
Constructions 1963 - 1965
6^th–29^th September 2007

Press Release

Recently there has been a timely reappraisal of the significant contribution art of the 1960’s had on post war European art. Of the artists from this period, few were more prominent during this time than Brian Rice. Critically acclaimed, his work was everywhere in the 1960’s & 1970’s. If you failed to visit the London galleries where he exhibited, particularly Denis Bowen’s New Vision Centre Gallery, which from 1963-1966 promoted his work, you could hardly fail to notice it in the Colour Supplements and Magazines. The Sunday Times, Observer, Nova, Tatler, House and Garden, Woman and even Peace News all featured his paintings. If you missed it in the editorial pages it was there again in the advertisements. Room interiors advertising White Horse Whisky, Hoover gas fires, Meredew Program whitewood furniture, British Wool carpets etc. All had Brian Rice pictures on their walls.

By the late 1960’s Rice was exhibiting world wide, represented by the infamous Eugene Schuster in London and the USA, he enjoyed enormous success being collected by major corporations, museums and celebrities. In 1968 when the ‘modern’ room series for the Geffrye Museum’s were designed, the picture on the wall was Rice’s. This was replaced in 1970 when the room was updated by another Rice work. Similarly, when Anne de Courcy designed The Evening News show house for the 1970 Ideal Home Exhibition, she chose Rice’s work to go on the wall. Even at the cinema you might spot Rice’s work in films like “Morgan, A Suitable Case for Treatment”, “The

Untouchables” or the Robert Redford film “The Candidate”.

Westbrook Gallery will be exhibiting Rice’s seminal construction paintings from this pivotal moment. These bold geometric abstract canvases constructed from uniform 9 x 9 inch squares, withhold and resist a simple figurative interpretation. These works are simultaneously, painterly and diagrammatic, challenging the viewer to decipher how and what is being presented.

Rice along with his colleagues Bridget Riley, Peter Sedgley, Derek Boshier and others, took post war British art in to new territory, new critical horizons were mapped out by these cool post pop, post Bauhaus avant-garde artists. This exhibition highlights an important evolvement in Post War British Art, and how significant artists such as Brian Rice developed a visual language which was and still is extraordinary. Siesemic shifts in recent contemporary art have placed a renewed focus on this legacy, particularly on optical and visual effects in painting. Rice’s work from this influential period appear as dynamic and essentially contemporary as ever, at a time when an appraisal of this period is acknowledging its significant contribution to modern art in the 20th century.

All works for sale.
Catalogue available

Westbrook Gallery

8 Windmill Street
London W1T 2JE
Tel: +44 (0) 207 580 1151
Information: Sylvia@westbrookgallery.com

Monday – Saturday 11 am – 6 pm Admission Free.