Artscribe

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Artscribe (1976–1992), titled Artscribe International from 1985, is a defunct British contemporary art magazine. It was notable for its commitment in the late 1970s and early 1980s to abstract art, and for giving popular art critic Matthew Collings his first break into contemporary art. The magazine was published on a bi-monthly basis.^[1]

Founding and early years

Artscribe was started in 1976.

In the early 1980s neo-expressionism epitomized by the work of Julian Schnabel, Anselm Kiefer, Jörg Immendorff, Francesco Clemente, and Steven Campbell had gained international attention. This kind of art was considered by powerful people in the art world to be loaded with important content that somehow transcended the visual dimension. Faure Walker rejected this view, and his scathing analysis of this mindset in art in an article on the 1981 exhibition A New Spirit in Painting co-curated by Nicholas Serota and Norman Rosenthal, made Artscribe appear out of step with contemporary trends. In 1983 Faure Walker left the magazine to pursue his painting career and Matthew Collings, who had worked on various aspects of its production since 1979, took over as editor.

Collings made the magazine's content more international, leading to the name change—which was introduced in 1985 when ownership of Artscribe passed on to a retired American couple, Pat and Jack Butler, who had homes in London, New York and Florida. Their financing enabled Artscribe to become a colour glossy. Collings continued his policy of internationalism, bringing in articles and reviews from the United States and continental Europe to mix with coverage of British art. He also set up a group of contributing editors based abroad, and persuaded high-profile artists to make unique cover-images and 'artist's pages' for the magazine. These included glamorous figures of the moment such as George Condo, Julian Schnabel, Markus Lüpertz, Albert Oehlen, Werner Büttner [de], Jean-Michel Basquiat, Eric Fischl and Nancy Spero, but also worthy Brits, such as Art & Language, Hannah Collins, Ian McKeever and Gerard Hemsworth. In 1987 Collings received a commendation for his transformation of Artscribe from the Turner Prize jury (other art-world figures singled out for commendation that year were Nicholas Serota, soon to be director of the Tate). Collings was fired as editor by the owners later that year after an argument with one of the office staff. (He went on to write and present popular TV programmes on art and now combines TV work with painting.)

Decline and demise

Collings's successor