Vaughan Grylls Home

Work ⟩1960s ⟩Horse Play 1967

About the Work

'Horse Box' was to be a large box which emanated a smell but which the viewer had difficuly on looking inside to find the source of the odour. It would be a shiny cube split down the middle by a one inch gap. This would allow the viewer enough room to stick his nose in but not his eyes. The inside would be caked in farmyard dung. I then changed the title to 'Horse Play' meaning boisterous fooling around but also whore's play. A chess piece (the knight) was cast 246 (16x16 - the number per side in chess) and painted black. This was a tribute to marcel duchamp who supposedly gave up art to play chess. The cube was built that the top was on the eye level of an adult of average height. It was painted ivory and sawdust was placed on the inside. This gave out a pleasant odour from the gap. On the lower edge of the box I drew a frieze. This consisted of a repeated image derived from the symbol for a crown and the symbol used on ordnance survey maps for a swamp. The black knight were then placed in ranks on the top. The gap was just large enough for the knights to fall over the precipice. During this time I became more interested in sex, Lewis Carroll and Ludwig Wittgenstein.
'Horse Play' was the last work I made as a student at wolverhampton. It reflected a time of personal uncertainty and my imminent move to london.