Merryn Schriever
Managing Director, Australia
Lot 81
Timothy Johnson(born 1947)Untitled, 1972 (paper sheet)
14 November 2018, 18:00 AEDT
Sydney, WoollahraAU$1,000 - AU$2,000
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Alex Clark
Head of Sale, Senior Specialist
Timothy Johnson (born 1947)
Untitled, 1972
signed and dated verso: 'Tim Johnson / 1972'
photographs and typed text on three sheets of paper
55.0 x 67.0cm (21 5/8 x 26 3/8in). (paper sheet)
signed and dated verso: 'Tim Johnson / 1972'
photographs and typed text on three sheets of paper
55.0 x 67.0cm (21 5/8 x 26 3/8in). (paper sheet)
Footnotes
PROVENANCE
Hogarth Galleries, Sydney
Private collection, Sydney, acquired from the above in 2010
These two works were produced c. 1972 by Tim Johnson, and included in an exhibition at Hogarth Gallery responding to the ousting of the government of Gough Whitlam in 1975. The typed text reads: 'By exhibiting the erotic sculpture of Allen Jones this gallery demonstrates a naive conception of sexist exploitation.
The image of woman as sexual object isn't objectionable. Nor is the use of fetichist imagery. But an image of woman as a sexual object that's also a piece of merchandise disguised as art is objectionable. It not only perpetuates but extends a crippling and socially disastrous ideology. This kind of image of a woman is legitimised simply by being made. In this case by the reputation of the artist as well as by this gallery which presumably finds the possible contribution to culture and money it might make a justification for its participation in the endorsement and exploitation of limited attitudes to women.
The art marketing system is something else again but we all choose a life-style and learn from our mistakes that there's nothing to learn.'
