Lot 239: m,w - BRUCE LACEY BORN 1927

SUPERMAN

height 171cm., 67 1/4 in.

mixed media construction

PROVENANCE

Gallery One, London, whence acquired by the present owner in 1963

EXHIBITED

London, Gallery One, First Exhibition of Automata and Humanoids, June 1963

NOTE

The political and social commentary of much British art in the late 1950s and 1960s has only recently been recognised with the reappraisal of artists as diverse as Robyn Denny, John Latham and Bruce Lacey. Lacey's work fits very closely with the contemporary culture of satirical exposure of the Establishment, and his early work making comic props for The Goon Show was very much in keeping with his abhorrence of the 'Never had it so good' ethos of the Macmillan era. However his high art credentials were also strong, being a former R.C.A. student and having assisted Jean Tinguely at the latter's 1959 I.C.A. performance.

Lacey's wonderfully homemade sculptures, incorporating household junk, army surplus and outdated electrical consumer goods, all exhibit a keen sense of satire, and the present work, like many of the period enclosed within a restricting Bacon-like cage structure, takes a pop-inspired theme, Superman, and punishingly discloses the futile reality of the fantasy hero. There are also references to his own interest in the contemporary medical belief that it would soon be possible to either replace or replicate the body's own functions, creating a form of 'superman' and much of his work at this time incorporates medical ephemera. Lacey continued his association with the counter-culture of the 1960s, touring with Vivian Stanshall and the Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band and filling the stage with automata that are still warmly remembered by fans.

As Lacey later recalled, he was glad when the term 'performance art' was coined, 'because it finally explained what I'd been doing all my life'.

'The objects I make are hate objects, fear objects and love objects. They are my totems and fetishes...It's what I feel about life, about people. Life is not a pretty thing; these are not pretty things' (the artist, quoted in catalogue to Bruce Lacey, An Exhibition of Humanoids and Constructions, Arts Council Gallery, Cardiff 1967)