Spur c. 1940

Robert W.R. Taylor made this ‘Spur’ out of who knows what, and who knows when! The first thing I notice is how faint and washed out everything is. It reminds me of an old photo. Everything is rendered with such detail, like the artist just kept going and going with these soft lines and subtle shifts in tone. I wonder if he ever thought, ‘enough is enough!’ Look closely at how the colour fades out towards the edges of the object. It is as if the spur is dissolving into the ground, or the page. The six-pointed star shape at the back kind of disappears into the neutral ground, but then it’s also like a sun, radiating out. It reminds me a little of the precision of someone like Durer, but it also has something of the naive project of folk art too, like Joseph Yoakum. Ultimately, though, it just looks like a spur! The thing itself is kind of weird and menacing. Maybe there’s something really direct and honest about the way it's represented.