We should be aware of the power a few words have to change the way we see and understand things.

 

John Berger in the T.V series 'Ways of Seeing' [also a book] expounded, with his collaborators, their views on the phenomena.

 

Perhaps the first artist not to use words as a decorative device ,like Braque and Picasso during the formation of cubism, but to present an examination of the text/ image juxtaposition was Magritte in The Key to Dreams' and since then quite a few have had a bash at it, including me. There was even a painting I put here — 'The Frogs Are Dying' — where it stated on the work itself, that the purpose of the text was to clothe the nakedness of the meaning; "I am saying this because I'm scared you'll understand me if I don't".

 

In this painting on view now I've done the opposite by removing the text from a flyer, also on view, you may see for your selves what has happened. I have no axe to grind. I like boxing.

 

J D Allman