Gary Hincks - Unoriginal Sins

07 Jun A MODEST HERO. 1986.

Posted at 18:05h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1986
19.1 × 11.7cm, 1pp blue on white artist's card with a drawing by Gary Hincks. The drawing shows a watering can in a floral garden setting.
The phrase "modest hero" was coined by Bernardin de Saint-Pierre when referring to the ordinary man (and woman) at the centre of the French revolution - but the watering can is a reminder of the Thermidorian reaction as The Directory came to replace the rule of Robespierre and eventually the rise of the dictator Napoleon. VG+.

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29 May IAN HAMILTON FINLAY. A DAVID. MARAT. 1986.

Posted at 19:58h in Invitation Cards

London: Victoria Miro Gallery, 1986
21 x 10.5cm, 42pp announcement card for a solo show. This card has two drawings - one each side - by Gary Hincks that is not reproduced anywhere else as far as we know. The plinth on one side shows a republican rosette with ribbons left with the words "A DAVID. MARAT". The second drawing is of the back of the same plinth but with gallery details over it. David, of course, painted the famous death of Marat painting, here Marat returns the favour with a simple tribute on the stone.
This is strictly an exhibition invite but it also could be regarded as an artist's card which was not released or categorised as such by Finlay. After some consideration we have left it as an announcement. VG+.

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27 May SEVEN SEED PACKETS. 1986.

Posted at 09:43h in Prints + Posters

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1986
63.2 x 40.5cm, full colour offset lithograph with seven "cut-outs" to form seed packets. Each packet has the name of one of the guillotined members of Robespierre's Committee for Public Safety who were deposed during the Thermadorian Reaction. The month when that happened was designated as "Arrisoir" in the revolutionary calendar - and the symbol of that month, the watering can is on each packet. Of course, seeds may be regarded as parts of plants that have been separated from the main body - a little like a head in a basket. VG+

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20 Mar 4 BLADES. 1986.

Posted at 17:51h in Artist's Books

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1986
7.6 x 8cm, printed outer folder content of six 7.6 x 8cm, 1pp cards. Each card has a drawing of a guillotine blade by Hincks with a quotation on it such as:
"The government of the Revolution is the despotism of liberty against tyranny. Terror is an emanation of virtue."
by Robespierre. Other quotes are from Denis Diderot, Nicolas Poussin and from Finlay himself who writes:
"Terror is the piety of the Revolution".
Finlay saw The Terror as in some sense pure - which was not an acceptance of the acts of the despots but a metaphysical impression of the firm beliefs of the Terrorists as being virtuous. The guillotine is often an image used in Finlay's works that stands for that purity as well as the fear and evil of man. VG+.
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27 Aug KLASSISCHE LANDSCHAFT. 1985.

Posted at 22:55h in Prints + Posters

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1985
48.5 x 32.5cm, green on cream paper offset lithograph with two drawings by Hincks one above each other. The first is after a landscape Johan Christian Reinhart etched in Rome in 1811. The second is with Finlay's addition of the word "W AVE" on the stone opening for the spring. In the Reinhart original the word in Greek `"XAIPE " means Hail or Farewell and Finlay notes that as being in relation to death. The AVE part of Finlay's text is the Latin equivalent to XAIPE but with the addition of the W (a little distance from the rest of the lettering) then the meaning is altered to that of water.
This was one of only 250 such prints made. In VG condition in like folder.

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14 May ARROSOIR. A REGENERATION: THE GARDEN AND GARDEN TEMPLE, LITTLE SPARTA…. 1984.

Posted at 17:36h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1984 23 x 18cm, 4pp card with 1pp 30 x 21cm insert. The announcement and artist's card for the re-opening of the Little Sparta Temple and Garden after Finlay closed it. The front of the card displays a painting by Gary Hincks of a watering can and a reference to the guillotining of the Robespierrists during the "month of Heat" (Arrosoir being the symbol of that month in the new revolutionary calendar).
The insert is A NOTE ON THE PRESENT SITUATION IN THE LITTLE SPARTAN WAR. An update by Finlay on the ongoing fight with the Strath=clyde region and that they had been granted a new summary warrant against the Garden Temple. Folded else VG+.

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21 Jul THE LITTLE DRUMMER BOY. VIALA. HOMMAGE A DAVID. 1983? SIGNED & DEDICATED BY GARY HINCKS.

Posted at 19:52h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, n.d.(1983?)
8.4 x 7cm, 8pp single folding card printed on one side only in blue and red on white. The first panel lists the publishing details, the second shows the ship that has reef knots that look like the decorations on the side of the drums of the revolutionary army - the boat is called The Littel Drummer Boy and the panel remembers Bara the martyr, the third panel has the name Viala with a tricolour ribbon - here memorialising the death of the young martyr Joseph Agricol Viala who tried to demolish a bridge while under attack and died calling for Liberty and finally, the text "Hommage A David" who was a third martyr to the Terrorists murdered in his bath. A card in honour of three Republican deaths.
This example is signed "To Janet (Boulton) yours Gary (Hincks)" in blue and red crayon. VG+.

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20 Feb THE ERRATA OF OVID. 1983.

Posted at 15:13h in Artist's Books

Dunsyre/Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, (1983)
7.8 x 8.2cm outer folder content of eight 7.8 x 8.2cmm 1pp cards. Each of seven cards (the eighth is a colophon) suggests single word changes to lines from Ovid's Metamorphoses to alter the meaning of the line and a drawing by Gary Hincks. As often Finlay enjoys the effects of minimal changes to cause maximum effect. Arguably a colleciton of artist's postcards but the cards could not stand alone so we agree this is categorised as an artist's book. VG+

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01 Mar AFTER JOHN FLAXMAN. R.A. 1981.

Posted at 17:20h in Artist's Postcards

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1981
3.6 x 11.8cm, 1pp. A drawing by Gary Hincks after Flaxman's drawing/print "Apollo and Diana discharging their arrows" from 1792 is updated where the landscape is now of a war time harbour for U-boats and also part of Albert Speer's "Atlantic Wall". Finlay refers to the U-boats as "classical" in his text and there is thus both a literary and a visual reference to The Odyssey. Moreover, the two gods are referred to as "an Allied air raid is in progress" (the original Pope quotation has "They Bend the Silver Bow with Tender Skill and Void of Pain the Silent Arrows Kill"). The story of how the children of Niobe were killed by APollo and Diana because of her fertility-shaming of their mother for only having two offspring is turned into a story of revenge against the Nazis. VG+.

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27 Aug NUDE. DRAPED NUDE. 1980.

Posted at 15:35h in Prints + Posters

Little Sparta: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1980
60 x 82cm, black on white offset lithograph with two drawings by Gary Hincks. The first cruiser is shown in elevation, the second also but with camouflage nettings over the bows. The allusion is to classical portraits of the human form - unclothed and clothed.

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15 Oct HANDLEY PAGE HEYFORD. 1978.

Posted at 08:15h in Artist's Postcards

Dunsyre: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1978
16.7 x 12.8cm, 2pp. Two drawings by Hincks of the Handley Page Heyford bomber (which was in service in the 1930s in the UK) and an English Hay-Barge are placed one above each other to create an equivalence. As well as the names being similar there are aspects of both which share a shape - the bomber is very long and has a flat base, and barges by definition tend to have flat bottoms to allow access in shallower rivers. Hincks drawings also use hatching on the hay piled up on the deck, the sails of the boat and fuselage of the plane to again emphasis similarities (and the landscape seen below the plane is also undulating much like the sea under the barge.

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04 Oct LEAF/BARK BOOKMARK. 1978.

Posted at 08:23h in Artist's Postcards

Dunsyre: Wild Hawthorn Press, 1978
15.8 x 3.9cm, 2pp. Black on green card with 5 small uncredited drawings by Gary Hincks the first four boats being above the word Leaf and the last ship above Bark. The card obviously references the structure of a tree but the first four "leaves" are smaller boats and the last one a Barque (aka Bark). Arguably like other bookmarks this could be placed as an object multiple but we have decided to keep it in this section because of previous classifications as a card by Murray and other catalogue raisonnes. VG+.

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