Title:
|
Constructing national identities through exhibition practices in post-war London : Anglo-French exchanges and contemporary sculpture on display, c.1945-1966
|
This thesis explores exhibition practices in London between 1945 and 1966 through
displays of contemporary sculpture related to Britain and France. The analysis of a
selection of government funded, private and commercial galleries and organisations
reveals how processes of selection, display, catalogue writing and reviews shaped, and
were paradoxically shaped by, slippery constructions of national identities. The post-war
period witnessed economic and social hardships but it was also a time for regeneration in
which the visual arts in Britain and France were afforded important roles. Anglo-French
political and military relationships during, and after, the war are well documented;
however, this thesis examines attitudes towards Anglo-French exchanges through the
visual arts by focusing on the role that exhibitions of sculpture in played in these
dialogues.
The thesis argues that although Anglo-French exchanges were exploited to feed
into the processes of national rebuilding, opportunities remained limited for the display of
contemporary sculpture from Britain and France in London during this period. The thesis,
therefore, highlights four exhibiting spaces that were key in promoting Anglo-French
exchanges in the field of sculpture; namely the Anglo French Art Centre (1946 to 1951),
Institute of Contemporary Arts (founded 1948), Hanover Gallery (1947 to 1973), and the
London County Council's (from 1966 the Greater London Council) triennial exhibitions
of open-air sculpture from 1948 to 1966. These sites facilitated exchanges through
personal contact, the physical exchange of objects for display, the commercial art market
and through exhibition practices. The thesis reveals that often during this period the
promotion of national pride and independent `schools' of sculpture lay beneath the
surface of outwards proclamations of mutual exchanges between Britain and France. It
also argues that constructing national identities through exhibition practices was
particularly prominent in relation to open-air exhibitions of sculpture in which links
between the sculptural object, land and the nation were stressed, and where dialogues of
independence and separation were privileged, rather than reciprocal exchanges. Thus this
thesis forms a major contribution to studies of sculpture exhibitions in London after the
war and to dialogues between exhibition practices and the manipulation of national
identity constructions during this period
|