 |
| Ellsworth Kelly Méditerranée 1952 oil on panel Tate Gallery |
 |
| Roberto Crippa Aurora Borealis 1952 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Le Corbusier Bull III 1953 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
Sarah Byng, Who Could Not Read and Was Tossed into a Thorny Hedge by a Bull
Some years ago you heard me sing
My doubts on Alexander Byng.
His sister Sarah now inspires
My jaded Muse, my failing fires.
Of Sarah Byng the tale is told
How when the child was twelve years old
She could not read or write a line.
Her sister Jane, though barely nine,
Could spout the Catechism through
And parts of Matthew Arnold too,
While little Bill who came between
Was quite unnaturally keen
On Athalie, by Jean Racine.
But not so Sarah! Not so Sal!
She was a most uncultured girl
Who didn't care a pinch of snuff
For any literary stuff
And gave the classics all a miss.
Observe the consequence of this!
As she was walking home one day,
Upon the fields across her way
A gate, securely padlocked, stood,
And by its side a piece of wood
On which was painted plain and full,
BEWARE THE VERY FURIOUS BULL.
Alas! The young illiterate
Went blindly forward to her fate,
And ignorantly climbed the gate!
Now happily the Bull that day
Was rather in the mood for play
Than goring people through and through
As Bulls so very often do;
He tossed her lightly with his horns
Into a prickly hedge of thorns,
And stood by laughing while she strode
And pushed and struggled to the road.
The lesson was not lost upon
The child, who since has always gone
A long way round to keep away
From signs, whatever they may say,
And leaves a padlocked gate alone.
Moreover she has wisely grown
Confirmed in her instinctive guess
That literature breeds distress.
– Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953)
 |
| Ben Nicholson Feb 28-53 (vertical seconds) 1953 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Martin Bradley Personnage Jaune 1954 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Peter Potworowski Forest (Cornwall) 1954 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Jack Clemente Volcanic City 1957 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Terry Frost Yellow Triptych 1957-59 oil on board Tate Gallery |
 |
| William Mactaggart Duet 1958 oil on board Tate Gallery |
Flower Arrangements
The flowers that a friend brings twice a week
Or even oftener accumulate
In plastic cups beside me on the table.
Not only I forget to throw them out,
But also I've a curiosity,
Fading a bit myself, to watch them fade.
They do it with much delicacy and style.
Shrinking into themselves, they keep their cool
And colors many days, their drying and
Diminishing would be imperceptible
But for the instance of the followers
Arranged beside them in the order of
Their severance and exile from the earth;
In death already though they know it not.
At last the petals shrivel, fold and fall.
The colors grow pastel and pale, the stems
Go brittle and the green starts turning brown;
The fireworks are over, and life sinks
Down in or else evaporates, but where?
From time to time I throw a cup away,
Wondering where lives go when they go out.
– Howard Nemerov (1920-1991)
 |
| Ivon Hitchens Divided Oak Tree No. 2 1958 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Patrick Heron Horizontal Stripe Painting, November 1957-January 1958 1957-58 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Denis Bowen Crystallised Landscape 1958 alkyd paint on canvas Tate Gallery |
 |
| Peter Lanyon Zennor Storm 1958 oil on board Tate Gallery |
 |
| Peter Lanyon Lost Mine 1959 oil on canvas Tate Gallery |