拍品专文
There is a typewritten commentary by the artist on a label attached to the reverse: 'THE BATTLE OF PROPAGANDA. Their cannon, their unpointed cannon bang./Less sane than Gibbon or Orang-Outang/They gibber in their propaganda dress./Whose 'No' receives for answer only 'Yes'. Each rocking-horse of power goes up and down,/unseating by turn by turn left or right clown./They battle backwards, every flag unfurled./Blindfold in this mad nursery of a world./Description of the painting by the writer./December 1953'.
In his introduction to the Arts Council catalogue, Mark Glazebrook comments on Armstrong's 'Battle' paintings: 'Symbolism had always attracted Armstrong, and in the early fifties he evolved his own symbolism in a series of gentle but ambitious paintings including 'The Storm', 'The Battle of Propaganda', 'The Battle of Religion', and 'The Battle of Nothing' which are a synthesis of many of his interests in theatre, architecture, politics, religion and mythology. The wooden swords in these battle scenes never clash. Armstrong wrote his own foreword to his exhibition at the Lefevre Gallery in November 1951: ... 'the clown gives an excuse for full draperies and the varied colours and patterns of the circus. He is, as well, the image of frustration, fighting battles of nothing, attempting a leap forward but doing a back somersault instead. He may assume other aspects of humanity in its predicament'.
In his introduction to the Arts Council catalogue, Mark Glazebrook comments on Armstrong's 'Battle' paintings: 'Symbolism had always attracted Armstrong, and in the early fifties he evolved his own symbolism in a series of gentle but ambitious paintings including 'The Storm', 'The Battle of Propaganda', 'The Battle of Religion', and 'The Battle of Nothing' which are a synthesis of many of his interests in theatre, architecture, politics, religion and mythology. The wooden swords in these battle scenes never clash. Armstrong wrote his own foreword to his exhibition at the Lefevre Gallery in November 1951: ... 'the clown gives an excuse for full draperies and the varied colours and patterns of the circus. He is, as well, the image of frustration, fighting battles of nothing, attempting a leap forward but doing a back somersault instead. He may assume other aspects of humanity in its predicament'.