Location

Country: Belgium
City: Brussels
Place: British Embassy, UK representation to the EU & UK delegation to NATO

"Loose Ends" seems to occupy a middle ground between abstraction and figuration. It is composed of a series of motifs showing tunnels and corridors, set out in a linear fashion. The sense of depth suggested by the recession of the passages and doorways is negated by the fact that they lead only to the surface of the painting. Beattie's interest in organising his paintings around compartmentalised sections began in the mid 1980s, when he had to substitute a group of drawings for a larger painting in an exhibition. The title does not refer directly to anything within the work, but was chosen for what Beattie calls its "poetic connection".

Born in West Hartlepool, Basil Beattie graduated from the Royal Academy schools in 1961, and was elected a member of the Royal Academy of Arts in 2006. Beattie was a pioneer of a new approach to painting in post-war Britain, having been significantly influenced by ‘The New American Painting’ show at the Tate in 1959, in particular the works of Mark Rothko and Barnett Newman. Over a sixty-year career, Beattie has remained part of a set of British artists whose works continue the legacy of Abstract Expressionism. He has exhibited widely in the UK since the 1960s and taught at Goldsmiths College in London in the 1980s and ‘90s. Beattie lives and works in Mitcham, Surrey.

Places

Subjects

triangle (abstract shape), grid, abstract

Materials & Techniques

cotton duck, oil, wax, mixed media (art object), oil painting

Artist

Basil Beattie (1935 - )

Title

Loose Ends

Date

1998

Medium

Oil and wax on cotton duck

Dimensions

height: 213.50 cm, width: 198.20 cm

Acquisition

Purchased from the artist, November 2000

Inscription

verso, on canvas: Basil Beattie / Loose Ends - 1998 - 7 x 6'6" / Oil & Wax; verso, on stretcher: LOOSE ENDS / 1998 / BASIL BEATTIE / LOOSE ENDS / OIL & WAX

Provenance

the artist

GAC number

17516