Sublimity, beauty and decorum

Book chapter

White, L. 2007. Sublimity, beauty and decorum. in: Petry, M. (ed.) Richmond Burton and Maisie Kendall: decorum Hornsey MOCA in conjunction with the Royal Academy Schools. pp. 5-10
Chapter titleSublimity, beauty and decorum
AuthorsWhite, L.
Abstract

This catalogue essay examines the work of two contemporary abstract painters, Maisie Kendall and Richmond Burton, who were showing together at the Royal Academy Schools Gallery in London, in Autumn 2007. It traces the fate of the "decorative" in modern art, and relates this term to Neoclassical attitudes to decorum. Tracing the turn away from decorum as a validating term in art, with the rise of the related (and gendered) notions of the sublime and the beautiful (with the privileging of the former over the latter), the essay argues that now in work such as Kendall's and Burton's the sensual pleasure of beauty - a kind of indecorous decorum, or a decorous indecorum - serves as a deliberately transgressive and even troubling element.
The essay was produced for the catalogue for the exhibition.

Keywordssublime; sublimity; beauty; history of aesthetics; painting; abstraction; decor; decoration; the decorative; ornament; decorum; gender; Neoclassicism; modernism; Romanticism.
Research GroupDiasporas
Visual Culture and Curating cluster
Page range5-10
Book titleRichmond Burton and Maisie Kendall: decorum
EditorsPetry, M.
PublisherMOCA in conjunction with the Royal Academy Schools
Place of publicationHornsey
ISBN
Hardcover9780955257797
Publication dates
PrintSep 2007
Publication process dates
Deposited08 Mar 2010
Output statusPublished
Publisher's version
LanguageEnglish
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