Sir. - In Luke Clancy's feature No more Molly Molones it is note worthy that it is traditional figurative sculpture or attempted traditional figurative sculpture that is condemned while with the Modernist sculpture genre he is more happy.
The point that Luke Clancy misses is that sculptors today simply cannot make the traditional figure as serious high art because the technical demands of doing it well are far beyond the current level of art college training. Clancy's view seems to be if you can't do it well don't do it at all. A point of view with which I have some degree of sympathy.
A recent exhibition of viking silver at the RHA Gallery included the work of the Norwegian figurative sculptor Per Ung. He told me that the art college in Oslo, with which he is associated, recently decided to set up new chairs of Classical Sculpture and Classical Painting - the word classical is used here to signify a cannon of objective excellence in the European figurative tradition and not a style or period in art history. The visual arts would thus have two teaching disciplines, a modernist one and a classical one, both with separate identities but artistically valid in their own terms.
For classical art the heritage preservation argument is important because the loss of classical skills effects the authority of its cultural heritage. A second argument is that traditional figurative art must be virtuoso as a starting point or base line if it is to regain its place in high art. To reach that base will take two generations of technique teaching.
The technically poor figurative work that Luke Clancy deplores shows no sign of abating - it is the absence of technical knowledge rather than lack of artistic talent that marks this sculpture out as bad. In fact we are going to see an avalanche of such sculpture in the near future. It is already in the making. The idea of banning it as bad art smacks of cultural dictatorship and also throttles an emerging art movement that may evolve towards excellence. A better long term idea would be to reconstitute training in classical skills in our art colleges along the lines of Oslo. The earlier poor figurative work could be considered as temporary and later be replaced by more accomplished work as skills are built up. After all £20,000 is only the price of a car which lasts seven to ten years. - Yours, etc.,
39 Richmond Avenue,
Monkstown,
Co Dublin.