British Council British Council Visual Arts

The impulse to reassess the terms of material practice is a recurrent motivation in art, and one of the many tendencies evident in recent times has been a renewed interest in informal materials and techniques, and in abstract form achieved through the arrangement of everyday objects. In Gary Webb’s abstract assemblages the formal structure is an incongruous yet precise alignment of found and constructed elements in steel, Perspex, glass, stone, fibreglass, wood, neon, even sound - a riotous celebration of organic and processed colour, material and shape. The resonance of the objects appropriated from contemporary culture or of the recognisable shapes is fleeting and perplexing. Cumulatively the symbolism locates the work in the seductive consumer world of the present but it is largely a component in the dislocated syntax of the formal arrangement, one of many elements subservient to the whole. The title ‘Cock and Bull’ may refer to the expression once commonly used to describe a ridiculous story and any attempt to read narrative into this work would be just that. The personal memory or relevance attached to individual elements in the work and even the titles contribute to the impact but as suggestions of meaning rather than allegorical signifiers.

Still Life, British Council 2000