Two years spent in India changed Cook's approach to painting from one of western composition and notation (and colour) to a more haptic, intimate practice in which sand drawings made in Varanasi inspired his switch to monochrome graphite. These ‘graphites’ were quickly exhibited internationally and became part of major collections of several major art institutions. His works have also been awarded several major painting prizes, including one at the prestigious John Moores Liverpool.
Introductory text to Making a Masterpiece, Bouts and Beyond (1450-2020), York Art Gallery, Oct 2019 - Jan 2020
Jeanne Nuechterlein
Introductory text to Making a Masterpiece, Bouts and Beyond (1450-2020), York Art Gallery, Oct 2019 - Jan 2020
The presence of ten of Cook’s graphite paintings at York Art Gallery have allowed direct comparison between his striking black-and-white images and the colourful paintings of traditional Dutch and Flemish still life. Initially, five of Cook’s works made between 2017 and 2019, inspired by paintings scattered across various European collections, were hung alongside other examples of Golden Age still life from York Art Gallery’s collection. While these five were on the walls, Cook created five new works that respond directly to paintings at York Art Gallery, and the new works have been switched into the installation for the final weeks of the exhibition.
The immediate visual contrasts have brought out in full force three complementary ways that Cook’s images transform traditional imagery: through their subject matter, their black-and-white aesthetic, and their experimental materiality. With each of these aspects, the comparison has heightened insights into the older works as much as the new ones.
Cook’s images focus more squarely on the moral problems involved in the drive to accumulate and then protect wealth, problems that many people today see as intertwined with the structures of capitalism. The urge to exclude or destroy any perceived threat to prosperity leads to deep social conflict, even military intervention.
Almost all of Cook’s paintings shown in the exhibition include still life’s most prevalent subject matter of luscious fruit and/or flowers, usually presented in expensive porcelain, silver or glass vessels. It is clear that for Cook these substances best convey the preciousness and human ingenuity at the heart of seventeenth-century Dutch (and modern) capitalism: they require sophisticated craft skills for their manufacture, and/or well-developed cultivation techniques and transportation networks to bring them together on a European domestic table.
Many traditional still lifes use striking juxtapositions to set objects in visual and thematic dialogue with one another, but they do so within well-established parameters. Cook’s paintings are all in a consistent size, but he creates more radical internal juxtapositions by interposing signs of violence and military power in the midst of the wealth, and he often does so in varying scales to accentuate the jarring contrasts.
Another striking point of comparison between traditional still life and Cook’s works—this time a more emphatic contrast—lies in their use of colour. Classic still life uses varied pigments suspended in oil to render the distinctive colour variations and textures of the attractive depicted materials. Cook’s unique graphite technique (powdered graphite dissolved in a mixture of oil and resin) eliminates differences of colour, so that his depicted materials can only be distinguished by form and, to some extent, texture. This choice has a number of consequences. One is to emphasise, in a literal way, the metaphorical darkness of the greed and violence that so often accompanies the extraction of wealth. The luscious substances retain a kind of shiny attraction, but their reduction to greyscale encourages viewers to beware the dangers of falling prey to their seduction. Another effect of Cook’s black-and-white aesthetic is to heighten the impact of absolute composition: the arrangement of light and dark across the surface becomes paramount, whereas with the older paintings it can sometimes be easy to mentally wander into their imaginary worlds and overlook the care with which they have been formally composed.
The role of the ground, or the setting, is another crucial feature of Cook’s black-and-white aesthetic. Most Golden Age still life paintings use a dark, indistinct background to highlight by contrast the specificity of the foreground objects. Cook’s images, however, create a more profound obscurity of ground/setting. While the foreground objects do typically emerge most forcefully, it is usually difficult to judge exactly where they might be located and how space extends behind or around them. The works often enhance this deliberate obscurity with vertical and horizontal streaks which, rather than representing any particular substance or form, enliven the space with a sense of vibration. Sometimes they set off the depicted objects, but at times they threaten to meld into them, leaving one wondering where exactly each form begins and ends.
These visual effects closely connect to the experimental nature of Cook’s works. He works on these images while they are laid horizontally, first applying broad strokes of liquid graphite across the bright white heavy paper. He renders the forms by pushing graphite strokes away to expose parts of the ground, as much as by adding or shaping the graphite. In other words, where the Golden Age paintings carefully build up oil paint across the surface of the canvas—usually in a meticulous, relatively slow technique—Cook subtracts as much as he adds, and he repeatedly changes his mind as he works, pouring white spirit over a well-developed composition and wiping across much or all of it to start again. Where oil paint is comparatively thick and viscous, Cook’s graphite is highly liquid and mobile, so that he can work quickly and instinctively. Some parts of an image are worked up in greater detail, while other elements are sketched more roughly, though when viewed up close, even the most seemingly detailed elements are soon revealed as well-judged brush or finger strokes. Once Cook is finally satisfied with the composition, the materials dry quickly, leaving the most recently-worked elements sharply defined, while earlier forms might remain half-washed out. Seen in person, the dried graphite subtly sparkles in the light, drawing attention to the works’ unusual materiality.
Cook’s self-invented technique profoundly shapes the effects and meanings of his works, in contrast with the earlier paintings. In many Dutch and Flemish still lifes, individual brushstrokes become apparent if you move close enough to the picture surface, but you don’t have to step back very far before they meld into a seductive illusion of reality. Materially as well as thematically, these oil paintings carefully build up a persuasive world of abundant objects, just at the edge of tangible reach. Their makers assert proud authorship through signatures, and viewers are invited to admire their pictorial analogue to the worldly wealth collected in the Netherlands. Cook’s works, in contrast, overtly undermine this illusionary world. He invites us to question whether indeed we are living in another Golden Age, and if so, whose. He experiments and improvises, creates and dissolves, pushes disparate ideas together and pulls them apart again. As each of the images interprets their sources in varying ways, they underscore how the creative process is never identical from one work to the next: Cook waits to see where each image will take him, experimenting to find the most vibrant combination of visual and thematic ideas.
All that Glisters
Introductory text to Making a Masterpiece, Bouts and Beyond (1450-2020), York Art Gallery, Oct 2019 - Jan 2020
The presence of ten of Cook’s graphite paintings at York Art Gallery have allowed direct comparison between his striking black-and-white images and the colourful paintings of traditional Dutch and Flemish still life. Initially, five of Cook’s works made between 2017 and 2019, inspired by paintings scattered across various European collections, were hung alongside other examples of Golden Age still life from York Art Gallery’s collection. While these five were on the walls, Cook created five new works that respond directly to paintings at York Art Gallery, and the new works have been switched into the installation for the final weeks of the exhibition.
The immediate visual contrasts have brought out in full force three complementary ways that Cook’s images transform traditional imagery: through their subject matter, their black-and-white aesthetic, and their experimental materiality. With each of these aspects, the comparison has heightened insights into the older works as much as the new ones.
Cook’s images focus more squarely on the moral problems involved in the drive to accumulate and then protect wealth, problems that many people today see as intertwined with the structures of capitalism. The urge to exclude or destroy any perceived threat to prosperity leads to deep social conflict, even military intervention.
Almost all of Cook’s paintings shown in the exhibition include still life’s most prevalent subject matter of luscious fruit and/or flowers, usually presented in expensive porcelain, silver or glass vessels. It is clear that for Cook these substances best convey the preciousness and human ingenuity at the heart of seventeenth-century Dutch (and modern) capitalism: they require sophisticated craft skills for their manufacture, and/or well-developed cultivation techniques and transportation networks to bring them together on a European domestic table.
Many traditional still lifes use striking juxtapositions to set objects in visual and thematic dialogue with one another, but they do so within well-established parameters. Cook’s paintings are all in a consistent size, but he creates more radical internal juxtapositions by interposing signs of violence and military power in the midst of the wealth, and he often does so in varying scales to accentuate the jarring contrasts.
Another striking point of comparison between traditional still life and Cook’s works—this time a more emphatic contrast—lies in their use of colour. Classic still life uses varied pigments suspended in oil to render the distinctive colour variations and textures of the attractive depicted materials. Cook’s unique graphite technique (powdered graphite dissolved in a mixture of oil and resin) eliminates differences of colour, so that his depicted materials can only be distinguished by form and, to some extent, texture. This choice has a number of consequences. One is to emphasise, in a literal way, the metaphorical darkness of the greed and violence that so often accompanies the extraction of wealth. The luscious substances retain a kind of shiny attraction, but their reduction to greyscale encourages viewers to beware the dangers of falling prey to their seduction. Another effect of Cook’s black-and-white aesthetic is to heighten the impact of absolute composition: the arrangement of light and dark across the surface becomes paramount, whereas with the older paintings it can sometimes be easy to mentally wander into their imaginary worlds and overlook the care with which they have been formally composed.
The role of the ground, or the setting, is another crucial feature of Cook’s black-and-white aesthetic. Most Golden Age still life paintings use a dark, indistinct background to highlight by contrast the specificity of the foreground objects. Cook’s images, however, create a more profound obscurity of ground/setting. While the foreground objects do typically emerge most forcefully, it is usually difficult to judge exactly where they might be located and how space extends behind or around them. The works often enhance this deliberate obscurity with vertical and horizontal streaks which, rather than representing any particular substance or form, enliven the space with a sense of vibration. Sometimes they set off the depicted objects, but at times they threaten to meld into them, leaving one wondering where exactly each form begins and ends.
These visual effects closely connect to the experimental nature of Cook’s works. He works on these images while they are laid horizontally, first applying broad strokes of liquid graphite across the bright white heavy paper. He renders the forms by pushing graphite strokes away to expose parts of the ground, as much as by adding or shaping the graphite. In other words, where the Golden Age paintings carefully build up oil paint across the surface of the canvas—usually in a meticulous, relatively slow technique—Cook subtracts as much as he adds, and he repeatedly changes his mind as he works, pouring white spirit over a well-developed composition and wiping across much or all of it to start again. Where oil paint is comparatively thick and viscous, Cook’s graphite is highly liquid and mobile, so that he can work quickly and instinctively. Some parts of an image are worked up in greater detail, while other elements are sketched more roughly, though when viewed up close, even the most seemingly detailed elements are soon revealed as well-judged brush or finger strokes. Once Cook is finally satisfied with the composition, the materials dry quickly, leaving the most recently-worked elements sharply defined, while earlier forms might remain half-washed out. Seen in person, the dried graphite subtly sparkles in the light, drawing attention to the works’ unusual materiality.
Cook’s self-invented technique profoundly shapes the effects and meanings of his works, in contrast with the earlier paintings. In many Dutch and Flemish still lifes, individual brushstrokes become apparent if you move close enough to the picture surface, but you don’t have to step back very far before they meld into a seductive illusion of reality. Materially as well as thematically, these oil paintings carefully build up a persuasive world of abundant objects, just at the edge of tangible reach. Their makers assert proud authorship through signatures, and viewers are invited to admire their pictorial analogue to the worldly wealth collected in the Netherlands. Cook’s works, in contrast, overtly undermine this illusionary world. He invites us to question whether indeed we are living in another Golden Age, and if so, whose. He experiments and improvises, creates and dissolves, pushes disparate ideas together and pulls them apart again. As each of the images interprets their sources in varying ways, they underscore how the creative process is never identical from one work to the next: Cook waits to see where each image will take him, experimenting to find the most vibrant combination of visual and thematic ideas.