Big Ring 1965

Curator: Let's turn our attention to David Annesley's "Big Ring" from 1965, a painted steel sculpture located here at the Tate Modern. Editor: It strikes me as deceptively simple, almost playful, yet with an undeniable underlying tension. The colors are calming, but the angles are so sharp. Curator: Indeed. Annesley was part of a wave of British artists exploring geometric abstraction, particularly influenced by American Color Field painting. The "Big Ring" presents us with an interplay of forms, of circles bisected and intersected by angular planes, creating a dialogue between curves and lines. Editor: And it’s all about the material too, isn’t it? The cool, smooth, industrial feel of the painted steel… I am fascinated by the process: how were these precise shapes bent, welded, and then painted? The hand of the artist is certainly present, a sort of physical conversation in shaping and joining and re-forming raw metal. Curator: Exactly. The artist invites us to consider formal relationships—shape, color, and composition—while also engaging in broader questions about space and perception. It embodies a certain modernist ambition to break from representation, to purify form. What is fascinating to me, though, is that, like much abstract art, it can also feel oddly reminiscent of certain lived experiences, even whilst it defies objective portrayal. Do we not see ourselves contained and shaped, by larger forces, much as this smaller green ring is embraced by the larger, white circle? Editor: The colours definitely enhance that interpretation, the fresh green feeling more fragile than the substantial white frame… it’s a complex arrangement and almost makes me question: what holds it all together? Visually and even physically. It creates such a dialogue through very basic geometry. Curator: It absolutely challenges us. Looking back, I am again struck by how a simple piece of material speaks about forms both visible and unseen. Editor: I completely agree. The focus on fabrication techniques reminds me of what Annesley achieved using such streamlined visual codes.