The so-called second generation of Chicago imagists matured in the middle and late 1950s, and their work, relative to that of the first group, is more cons;istently imbued with the surrealist spirit. Sometimes this spirit expresses itself in veristic terms, as in the curiously populated spaces of Kerig Pope and William Schwedler, while Irving Petlin and Robert Barnes have allowed a measure of automatism to dictate the ambiquities and the painterly surfaces of their own highly complex narratives. H.C. Westermann came to light in the mid-1950s too. Though he is about the same age as the artists of the first group, the qualities of uncanniness and irrational logic in his constructions are related to the more intensely surrealist attitudes which marked Chicago art in the 1950s. Those attitudes had, if anything, deepened in the 1960s; by the middle of the last decade it had become apparent that a third identifiable generation of imagist artists had emerged here. Like many of their predecessors, this most recent group has shown a pronounced taste for fantasy in general and surrealist incongruities in particular, but their relation to the 1960s is evident in the liberal use most of them make of popular imagery in conveying their fancies. They also often exhibit together in small ensembles with corporate names, reminiscent of rock groups -like The Hairy Who, The Non-Plussed Some, The False Image, James Nutt, Gladys Nilsson, James Falconer, Suellen Rocca, and Karl Wirsum, who belong to The HairyWho-thefirst and perhaps the most widely known of these groups - tend toward an irreverent urban imagery based on comic strip stylizations and consciously low verbal doub'le entendre. Ed Flood's work is clearly influenced by the decor on pinball machines, while Christina Ramberg and Phil Hanson revive the look of advertising illustration of the 1930s and 194.0.'" Franz SCHULZE, Chicago, maio de 1972 "Any discussion of H.C. Westermann's art must begin with th", observation that his work is, ·to anextraordinary degree, a phenomenon sui generis. There is little profit in attempting to consider his oeuvre as a present-day continuation of welldefined earlier movements, such as Dada or Surrealism though it is true that aspects of these artistic currents are to some degree sub-sumed intermittently in his work. But this isdueto the inevitable absorption of the esthetic visual surround that ali of us experience, andis 'not in any way a direct function of Westermann's deliberate artistic intentions. 162
From its beginning in the early 1950s Westermann's production has displayed a remarkable and puzzling variety of approaches to form, materiais, genres, and subjects. Although most of his work is three dimensional, it was very and (at least twenty years ago( to consider it sculpture in the normal sense. Nor did it appear to be an extension of the Surrealist objet, like that of Ernst, Dali, Mir6, and others. Additionally, the protean formats Westermann moves among so freely dissociate his works from the single-minded focus on nostalgic contents (in both senses of the word) that is so distinctive in the work of American fantasists such as Joseph Cornell. Perhaps the most productive approach to Westermann's art is through some reflection on the processes (as distinct from the techniques) of his creation. Westermann does not articulate specific inner fantasies that have been initially concretized in his mind in the manner suggested by Dali, who has described some of his pictures as "hand-painted dream photographs." That kind of process implies that through a focused reflection, or other kinds of imagination-stimulating practices, the artist form's a relatively clear notion of what the intended work is to be, and then goes ahead and executes it. Even the automatic and chance techiniques of Surrealist artists were more often than not but trigger mechanisms to impel the fantasy or inner vision up to the levei where it could be given a recognizable artistic form What Westermann does is distinctly different and rather more comp.lex. The images and ideas with which his objects are replete seem to come out of another, still deeper area of inner being, and the artist has remarked that he feels the intensifying generation of the unknown. experience pressing from within, so that its final form, nature, and meaning are only disclosed to him as while he works, and that he knows that the work is finished "when it feels right." Dennis ADRIAN, Exposição Made in Chicago, Chicago, outubro de 1974 HUMAN CANON BALL, 1971 Xilogravura Edição: 12/18 40,2cm x 50,8cm