Overview
Eduardo Paolozzi (1924-2005) was one of Britain's leading sculptors from the 1940s up until the early 2000s. Following ground-breaking exhibitions at the ICA in the 1950s with the Independent Group, such as Growth and Form (1951); Parallel of Art and Life (1953); and This is Tomorrow (1956); he is acknowledged as one of the creators of British Pop Art. Paolozzi repeatedly experimented with metamorphosing the human figure, blending geometry with nature. Having witnessed huge technological changes during his lifetime, Paolozzi's work examined the interface between art and science, man and machine. He conveyed a humorous but poignant message of a technological world in which people run the risk of becoming extent, rendering man as a graphic avatar, human flesh supplanted by machinery.
Paolozzi gave an illustrated lecture entitled Bunk at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in 1952, the first event presented by the newly formed Independent Group. This was the first time that images from vernacular culture were treated as fine art. The publication of this material, prints two decades later, reintroduced these images to a new generation who had grown up with Pop. BUNK! took its name from a quotation of Henry Ford.
"History is more or less bunk. It's tradition. We don't want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker's damn is the history we make today."
- Henry Ford Interview in Chicago Tribune (25 May 1916)
