Richard Hamilton, ICA

This exhibition, one of two flanking the major Richard Hamilton retrospective at Tate Modern this Spring, will see the re -staging of two of his earliest installations - Man, Machine and Motion (1955) and an Exhibit (1957). 

Hamilton was very closely associated with the ICA and a member of The Independent Group - a  group  of critical thinkers, artists (including Eduardo Paolozzi) architects, sculptors, photographers and writers, who regularly met in the original Dover Street premises of the ICA and whose discussions centred around art theory and mass and popular culture. These early installations speak of the profound influence immersion in this environment went on to have on Hamilton and the other members of the Independent Group.

Man, Machine and Motion was originally staged at The Hatton Gallery, Newcastle University (where Hamilton taught art) and later at the ICA in Dover Street. It was considered ground - breaking in terms of subject as well as format. A system of geometric panels divides up the gallery creating compartmentalised spaces within it. Each group of panels displays photographs highlighting the development and the extent of man’s capacity to travel: some large-scale blow ups, some focussed on tiny details, some historical and some contemporaneous to the era. At this point in history man had not yet stepped upon the moon but the possibility of space travel, of which public speculation was rife in the 50’s, was clearly at the forefront of Hamilton’s mind. 

an Exhibit (1957) is similar in composition. Designed in conjunction with artist Victor Pasmore and the art critic and curator Lawrence Alloway, it consists of a flexible system of opaque and transparent hanging perspex panels. The effect is rather like walking into a 3D painting, with each turn revealing a different view of these floating blocks of perspex colour. Original publicity for the installation stated that ‘An Exhibit is a game, an artwork, an environment, preplanned, individuated, verbalised by Richard Hamilton, Victor Pasmore and Lawrence Alloway, to be played, viewed, populated.’

This exhibition not only celebrates Hamilton’s association with the ICA, it draws attention to two early works which went on to have a major influence on the way in which art is practised, viewed, curated and displayed today. The ICA is also hosting an afternoon symposium to accompany the exhibition which will explore and highlight Hamilton’s long lasting and wide reaching influence - speakers to include Dr Victoria Walsh, Head of the Curating Contemporary Art Programme at The Royal College of Art.