Never underestimate the simple house brick
Tate Liverpool's Brickworks exhibition is a perfectly-formed show in a more intimate space
When I told my Mum I’d been to an exhibition about bricks she raised an eyebrow. I knew she would. When I was about 10, my family was walking around Ormskirk Market and my Dad started pointing out the different ‘brick bonds’ - the varieties of patterns bricks are laid in. Until then I had never paid bricks much attention, and had assumed, if I’d thought about it at all, that they were always placed in the same arrangement. So while my Mum and younger sister were teasing us with exaggerated yawns, I was fascinated.
I had the same reaction recently when a friend told me about the many different designs of cherry picking ladders. As the trees are so tall, the handmade wooden ladders had to be much wider at the bottom than the top, and sometimes had as may as 65 rungs. But beyond that, the designs would often differ depending on where they were made and the maker’s personal style.
Whether ladders or brick walls, I love the idea that humans can’t help but add their own stamp of creativity to their most practical creations. Objects can be both useful and beautiful - ticking off both of William Morris’ famous requirements for items in your home. And Tate Liverpool’s Brickworks exhibition, which is the subject of this edition’s main read, shows that bricks can be many other things too - political, nostalgic, safeguarding, dangerous, aggressive, even teasing.
You’ll never look at a brick wall the same way again
It’s very easy to underestimate a brick. We encounter them every day - holding up the roofs of our homes, in the walls lining the streets and, as we’ve sadly seen this week, in news footage of riots - so perhaps we can be forgiven for not appreciating their brilliance. Not so the artists featured in Tate Liverpool’s latest exhibition, all of whom have found bricks the perfect mode of expression for a wide range of statements.
The show links the gallery’s past to its present and future. Its theme is a cheeky nod to Tate Liverpool’s first ever exhibition, where Carl Andre’s “pile of bricks” piece Equivalent VIII surprised visitors, and acknowledges its current location within the Royal Institute of British Architect’s North headquarters at Mann Island. It also hints at the current redevelopment of its Albert Dock building, itself composed of 23 million bricks.
Tamar Hemmes, Curator, Tate Liverpool, says: “Brick is a building material that is everywhere, but we just never pay attention to it, and actually it's really quite beautiful.
“When we started speaking about the exhibition, we were looking at the fact that, especially back in the day, bricks were made by hand using locally sourced materials. And so a brick would actually show you where it was made, because they would look different in different places. I think it's really interesting that it's a craft to make these bricks, but it's never seen in that way.”
Most immediately striking is French-Algerian artist Kader Attia’s “Untitled” (Concrete Blocks) 2008, a rectangular display of angled blocks, which takes up most of the gallery’s floor. Arranged to resemble French high-rise developments that were in turn based on a 1960s housing experiment in Algeria, they are a reminder of how housing design that ignores the needs of its residents ultimately denies them individuality and comfort. The work also references wave breakers Attia remembers from his childhood - enormous concrete barriers on the beach that prevented people in Algeria from leaving by boat.
Hemmes says: “He's a really intelligent artist in the way he layers these different themes of architecture and colonialism, and looks at modernist architecture almost as a way of repressing people. The idea that you've got people coming from a place like Algeria looking for a better life in France, and where they end up is in these housing blocks that don't offer them that life at all.
“They often have very few windows. There's not a lot enough space for people to form communities around them.”
Many of the works speak about the contradiction between bricks’ role in creating places of safety and shelter, and in keeping people out. Untitled 1969 by Jannis Kounellis, a section of dry stone wall built into the gallery wall, has to be recreated from locally-sourced materials each time it is displayed. Nearby is Keith Arnatt’s photographic piece A.O.N.B (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty) 1982-84, which shows a gap in a dry stone wall that has been filled in with breezeblocks.
Hemmes says: “You get that juxtaposition between very traditional crafts and an industrial way of making, but also it's blocking access. People can't go through this doorway that used to be there. So it raises a lot of questions about why can't we go to these places? And who owns the landscape? Who has access to it?”
We’re all too familiar with bricks being hurled in protest but Tamas St Auby’s Czechoslovak Radio 1968, 1969, 2008 shows them being used in a less violent form of agitation. Following the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 and the banning of radio broadcasts, people would attach antennae to bricks and pretend to listen to them. Despite surely being aware that these constructions were not able to broadcast sound, the Soviet Army confiscated many of them: “I love the idea that they were being kept busy by confiscating these bricks that didn't have any function, which would have taken them away from banning actual broadcasts,” says Hemmes.
Everything on display in Brickworks are from the Tate Collection, answering the call from visitors who have missed seeing collection works since the gallery’s closure last October.
“Tate's collection is the nation's collection so people probably feel a sense of ownership over the works and want to have access to them,” says Hemmes. “It's really nice for us to hear that people want to see them.”
Tate Liverpool’s temporary relocation to a space only a fraction of its usual size was always going to be a challenging sell to regular visitors, but this show makes good use of its more intimate location and is a welcome chance to see works from the Tate Collection.
Brickworks is at Tate Liverpool/RIBA North until January 12, 2025.
On the bookshelf
The Art Of The Brick by Nathan Sawaya
Features hundreds of photos and behind-the-scenes details of the incredible LEGO brick sculptures and portraits that have made Nathan Sawaya the world’s most famous LEGO artist.
British Bricks by David Kitching
Did you know that there is an almost infinite range of bricks and brick colours? David Kitching uses individual brick designs to explore the history of British brickworks, once found in every small district in the country.
These book links are affiliates connected to Stored Honey’s bookshop.org page. Should you decide to buy them, the small commission will go towards Stored Honey’s running costs.
Thank you for reading Stored Honey. If you are from an arts organisation or an individual who would like to be featured in a future edition, get in touch on X/Twitter, in the comments or by dropping me a line at tostoredhoney@gmail.com.
Paid members will receive their monthly must-see tips for August early next week and I’ll see you all on Tuesday for the next North West arts news bulletin,
Laura