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Work ⟩1960s ⟩Ludwig Wittgenstein's Palace of Pun 1968

About the Work

This consisted of an exhibition made in cardboard and polystyrene which packed flat and could be carried around easily. I made and exhibited the work in less than a week. It was first shown at Goldsmiths' College, as part of my teacher-training exhibition. Later the Slade expressed interest in showing it shortly after I arrived there.
I started by designing the catalogue. It contained line drawings of the sculptures in the show. The sculptures were titled before they were drawn. The catalogues were held in a cardboard dispenser called 'Please Take One' - itself a sculpture. The other sculptures in the show were 'An Underground Car Park - Full Up!' (polystyrene tiles in a grid on the floor with one missing, replaced by a pile of earth), 'Helmet Brained' (a negative reference to Henry Moore, made out of two large, curved pieces of card with nothing inside, held together by paper clips), 'Brian Wallflower' (dance steps drawn on a sheet of polystyrene, a negative reference to formalist sculptor Brian Wall, whom I'd heard could not dance, and also a positive reference to Andy Warhol, who could dance and who had already done a piece on the subject), and lastly, 'Ludwig Wittgenstein's Palace of Pun' (which looked like a giant birthday card used in a pantomime, with 'Best of Luck - Ludwig' scrawled in the corner).
The external assessor did not approve of this final exhibition, writing that it was 'very thin', which, of course, it was. However, Philip King, my tutor at the Slade, liked it. He fetched Richard Wollheim, Grote Professor of the Philosophy Of Mind and Logic, who was amused by it. Professor Wollheim gave me a signed copy of his book Art and Its Objects a few days later.