The artistic side of the Fifth Beatle
Aug 22 2008 by Vicky Anderson, Liverpool Daily Post
The artistic side of the Fifth Beatle
“The Abstract Expressionism work, while quite unusual to be doing in Europe at the time, wasn’t totally original, it was a movement that came out of America.
“We have done a lot of shows of people related to the School of Art, and it seemed quite a good thing to do for 2008, as there hasn’t been a show of his work in the city for some time.
“In early 1961, he tried to enrol for a teaching diploma at the School of Art, but they wouldn’t accept him – not because he wasn’t any good, but because they felt his direction lay as an artist rather than a teacher.
“How his career would have pro- gressed is a great unanswered ques- tion because he died so young.”
Frustratingly for aficionados and collectors, the majority of Sutcliffe’s work is untitled, but one of the coups of the exhibition is a series of abstracts from his late Hamburg stage.
Liverpool University has purchased two original Sutcliffes during the sourcing of the exhibition, but almost everything on display has come from his estate, courtesy of the artist’s sister Pauline, who now lives in New York and will be coming over to Liverpool next week to officially launch the exhibition.
Explaining why she agreed to get involved with the exhibition, she says: “It was a curious mixture of nostalgia for our home town that came at a moment when the university was putting all the plans in place for the refurbishment and re-opening of the gallery.
“We had to wait until the building was ready, but I couldn’t not do this, it was such a wonderful opportunity.
“To have been involved with something for a very long time and see all the hard work that everybody has put into it, I am really looking forward to walking in and seeing it.”
Some personal effects of Sutcliffe’s, including a college scarf, cartoons and membership cards to Liverpool music clubs, including the Jacaranda, as well as other long-gone haunts, are also on display to give a little more of a flavour of the artist’s Liverpool life.
A catalogue to accompany the exhibition, which will be available next week, features a collection of writings from a variety of personal and academic sources, including Astrid Kirschherr, Sutcliffe’s girlfriend at the time of his death, to pop journalist Jon Savage.
THE Stuart Sutcliffe Retrospective is now on at the Victoria Gallery & Museum until January 31, 2009, Tuesday to Saturday, 10am to 5pm.
