The Problem with Steel: Garth Evans’ Placement with the British Steel Corporation (1968–71)

From 1968–1971, sculptor Garth Evans participated in an artist placement with the British Steel Corporation. Evans’ placement was associated with the Artist Placement Group, a coalition of artists that negotiated placements in government and industry throughout the UK and Western Europe during the 1970s. This essay utilizes archival photographs, feasibility studies and reports, to consider Evans’ placement and his sculpture Breakdown (1971) within the context of British industrial politics of the late 1960s and 1970s, a time when many artists did not have experience in industry themselves, yet their identities were strongly tied to working class heritage. From Saint Martins’ Sculpture Department to the British Steel Corporation’s factory floor, this paper contextualizes and questions the shifting relationship between material, labour and class within Evans’ placement, and subsequently, the contextual conditions for an artist making work within the framework of the corporation.

The fellowship that evolved into an APG placement committed BSC to pay for materials but also, through Steveni's negotiation, simultaneously guaranteed that there was no pre-determined expectation of a given outcome on the part of the artist. 6 In fact, there could be no outcome at all. While the APG would sharpen contract negotiations as the placement progressed, these initial conversations with Lord Melchett and Chris Patey established the priority of securing the artists' time rather than a work of art. However, the APG did not outline how artists' time should be spent. The immaterial labour was, therefore, importantly undefined, rendering the traditional definition of a contract in Britain null and void. 7 In addition to what can be identified as strategies of negation, the pairing of Evans and BSC was also strategic. Steveni recounts: 'Evans was not primarily nominated for his material portfolio but for his line of questioning.' 8 In correspondence from the period, Evans argued that the artist's independence in the context of BSC was not a 'personal anxiety' but a necessity to the success of the proposal. 9 The APG and Evans' concerns over artistic autonomy were seemingly met with a mutual understanding by BSC. An excerpt from an article written the following year (1969) in the British Steel Journal, titled 'Sculpture in Steel,' states: 'It seems reasonable to suggest that (APG placement) may offer one of the most fruitful ways for industry to supplement state patronage and bring about a closer understanding of the arts and artists as they Steveni and the Artist Placement Group, "Sculpture Fellowship British Steel Corporation Statement." The proposal would in some variations be supported collaboratively by E.A.T. Although this joint effort seems to have soured only a year later, with APG arguing E.A.T. did not accurately reflect APG's principals namely their concept of the "open brief," as a result E.A.T. would not work collaboratively on placements. 6 My interviews with Barbara Steveni (November 2016-2019 and a later undated document titled "Sculpture Fellowship British Steel Corporation Statement" indicate that a new APG contract was negotiated and recorded with BSC. This new contract included that BSC pay for the cost of exhibiting the work at the later Hayward Gallery APG exhibition, publicity and a 10% commission to the APG. However, it is unclear when exactly during Evans' placement this document was negotiated and printed. 7 Removes the third criterion of "contract" under British Common Law, which is "consideration". See http://www.a4id.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/A4ID-english-contract-law-at-a-glance.pdf [last accessed 1 December 2020]. 8 Author's interview with Barbara Steveni, November 2018. are and not as industry might wish them to be.' 10 The British Steel Journal's statement can be read as an invitation, but it should be recognized as an invitation to enlist artists' perspectives into the corporate apparatus. To enter BSC's context was to enter a precarious grey zone whose conditions were defined by the steel industry.
During the 1960s and 70s, the steel industry not only represented the health of the UK's industrial economy but was globally symbolic of an older industry facing post-war decline. A Mark Abrams poll in 1968 showed that the majority of the public thought ' almost anything was more modern than steel,' a lackluster public opinion that BSC hoped they could change for their own survival. The same year as the start of Evans' placement, the BSC launched an advertisement campaign titled 'Steel Appeal' to re-imagine steel's image. The campaign took on a variety of forms, from the comical advertisement of a woman modelling a dress made out of steel to the more functional proposals for furniture design. If steel was perceived as innovative, it was good for business. 11 The potential for Evans' placement to contribute to this campaign is further reflected in the placement proposal (1969). BSC states: Sculptors working in steel have so far confined their attentions mainly to simple shapes and structures and little work has so far been done in this country on exploring the possibilities of using steel in advanced techniques, fully exploiting its potential in the field of creative art. The interaction between the artist and the industry will, it is felt, be of benefit to both. As a part of its effort to promote widespread awareness of the merits of steel as a material, the corporation has recently embarked on a large national advertising campaign. The sculpture fellowship represents another way in which the corporation wishes to draw attention to the versatility and variety of the material it produces. 12 10 British Steel Corporation (1968b), "Sculpture in Steel." British Steel Journal,April,p. 34. 11 Lord Melchett (1968), "Introduction to the British Steel Journal." The British Steel Journal, April, p. 2. 12 Barbara Steveni and the Artist Placement Group and the British Steel Corporation (1969), "Sculpture Fellowship British Steel Corporation Proposal." 26 June, Tate Archive, London, UK.

Jackson: The Problem with Steel 6
To understand artists as they are, to 'be of benefit to both,' created the potential for the aging steel corporation to salvage its reputation. Technological innovation could increase sales, but perhaps more importantly, it was the potential for an innovative re-branding that could be extracted from the imagination of the artist.  Garth Evans (1969), "Garth Evans-Report." Tate Archive, Tate, London, UK. 14 Ibid. 15 Hulks (2013), "Breakdown." pp. 53-54. 16 Ibid. the popularity of the material at the time. This line of enquiry deserves greater consideration.
In the early 1960s, Saint Martin's Sculpture Department and instructors such as Antony Caro popularized the use of steel as a material and became a dominant force within the sculptural production of the school and the larger art market. The popularity of steel within Caro's work and, subsequently, the Saint Martin's Sculpture Department was largely inspired by the American David Smith's scrapyard sculpture being made and shown at the time. 17 As Hulks states, 'Caro was attempting to inject a new sense of optimism into sculpture, part of a conscious attempt to depart from 'the geometry of fear' to seek instead inspiration from the general economic upturn of the 1960s much of which derived from America.' 18 However, and significantly, this inspiration materially manifested in the choice of steel for these two artists.
While Smith's use of steel as a material would greatly influence a generation of British sculptors, his Voltri series in 1962 is of particular relevance to Evans. The series was made during Smith's trip to Voltri, Italy, for the project Sculptures in the City and is recognized for the unprecedented scale of Smith's production: the legendary twenty-seven sculptures in thirty days. 19 However, significantly, the sculptures were made from discarded industrial material gathered from abandoned factories that had recently closed, signaling, much like Evans, the choice of steel at a moment of the industry's economic decline. 20 Smith's influence can therefore be viewed formally, as I will now discuss in the work of Caro, but equally as contextually site-specific, motivating a multifaceted interest in steel that played out within British art schools, and specifically at Saint Martin's. 17 Antony Caro (1960), 24 hours, painted steel sculpture, Tate Britain collection. 18 Hulks (2013), "Breakdown." pp. 53-54. 19 Exhibition Catalogue, Cambridge, Ma., Fogg Art Museum (1966), David Smith 1906-1965 Ibid. This interest in industrial materials reflected his work with Studebaker cars in 1925 and later his studio at the Iron Works terminal in Brooklyn in 1933.

Jackson: The Problem with Steel 8
Influenced by Smith's use of industrial materials, Caro fused steel configurations on the ground and often painted them. Paul Moorehouse's text, Antony Caro (2005), describes Caro's process as working in extremely close proximity to his materials.
However, to Moorehouse, Caro's process was significantly more aligned with American abstract painters such as Jackson Pollock rather than other sculptors at the time. Moorehouse states: '… the small scale of the studio prevented Caro from envisioning each part to the whole instead, it is possible to see an unpremeditated relationship with the evolving work from within, … parallels with Jackson Pollock's assertion that while working he was "in the painting."' 21 In discussing the problems of sculpture, Evans would similarly assert in a much later interview with Jon Wood (2013a), 'The problem was to make it so that it didn't invite the viewer to see some hierarchy or pattern within it, and find some way of making sense of it. In a sense it was like an all-over painting and that's where it connected with American painting, in some way which interested me.' 22 Caro's concept of building a 'sculptural experience' was like American Abstract Expressionism, largely defined by Clement Greenberg's assertion that sculpture existed separately from life. This was an autonomous experience that for Caro simulated a musical score, envisioning steel as multiple units working together to create a cohesive sculpture. 23 Caro's 24 hours (1960) and other early sculptures made from steel show the physicality of this score, they are heavy and mechanized, their gravity amplified by black and earthy hues. Reminiscent of Jean Tinguely's kinetic sculptural machines, 24 hours is made from large circular shapes that appear frozen in rotation. The composition is simultaneously mechanical and monumental. 24 However, only two years later works such as Early One Morning (1962) show Caro's mechanical monumentality had shifted from heavy machinery to airy and bright In contrast, the A Course was in many ways designed as an experimental and critical response to Saint Martin's own sculptural legacy, and can be considered a uniquely self-reflexive moment for an art school. 33  was only given polystyrene wrapped in brown paper, craft paper, string, plaster and water, and a stopwatch.' 35 From Deacon's account, the A course can be considered as much psychologically as it was materially engaged, striving to first awaken students to their alienated condition under capitalism and then to encourage them to de-program themselves to ultimately achieve more freedom in their practice. From Deacon's description, Evans' specific approach to the A course can be described as restrictive and largely structured around specific materials. Evans' teaching approach, like his own practice, bypassed divisions between material and concept by framing his inquiries around questions and restrictions. The students were encouraged to pursue an artistic process within these parameters that was not actively judged or critiqued by their instructors.
Significantly, the British Steel Journal (1968) similarly describes Evans' process from the beginning of the placement, stating that 'Evans explores the relationship between certain shapes … imposes on himself an extreme set of rules … and has a very negotiate steel's increasingly complex connotations. Furthermore, Evans had trouble separating himself from the material. He described his process as a never-ending dance with the pieces of steel. 40 No matter how many times he rearranged them he was unable to commit to a composition. If formulating a problem was the first step to his sculptural process, his problem here would be: what to do with steel? Evans' photographic framing isolates these objects from human and mechanical activity. 42 Significantly, he chooses not to capture the act of learning or more accurately training within the corporation but, instead, captures its aftermath, its debris. Evans' choice of composition presents a ghostly portraiture that draws many parallels with Carl Andre's photographs of found sculptures from 1960/61. However, 42 Garth Evans (1971), Contact sheet, Henry Moore Foundation.   According to newspapers at the time, BSC's interest in renovating steel's image was not merely for innovation but was politically strategic. The Times argued that, for BSC, the more spectacularized steel became the more it could distract from internal changes occurring in the corporation. The Times, in 1970, states that 'the ostentatious BSC publicity … has really been a desperate attempt to keep up appearances in public while behind the scenes the moles worked out a new product organisation.' 48

The Steel Problem
The 'new product organisation' that The Times refers to was a byproduct of the Nationalisation Act of 1967. The Act advocated a grandiose vision for re-nationalizing the steel industry and a full scale reorganization, a restructuring that would take place throughout Evans' placement. 49 As referred to by The Times, the company had historically been organized geographically, resulting in strong regional ties between site, employees and management. However, in 1969 two reports were produced (BSC Second and Third Reports on Organization) by Dr. H M Finiston, Deputy Chairman of British Steel, and his committee, advocating for a shift from regional grouping to product grouping. The reports indicated that product grouping would more easily accommodate the increasing new technology being adopted by the corporation, most significantly the electric arc furnace. This mentality was also fueled by a broader corporate assumption: 'if we could get the structure down everything else would follow suit.' 50 However, the implementations of this plan had many ominous side effects.
Eliminating regional organization weakened employees' sense of community, and 47 Ibid.

The Steel Crisis
Part of BSC's strategy of corporate optimism was a pre-emptive measure to assuage the negative impact the structural changes were having on their employees. Whether they were fearful of worker unrest or simply wanted to create better working relations as part of rebranding their identity, along with restructuring came a corporate and government mandate to seek out consultation to better express the concerns of 51 John Valiey Weidenfeld (1994), The History of British Steel. UK: Wilmer Brother Limited. 52 Dudley and Richardson (1990), Politics and Steel in Britain, p. 59. 53 Richardson (1990), Politics andSteel in Britain, p. 34. 54 Lord Melchett (1968), "Introduction to the British Steel Journal." p. 2. 55 Dudley and Richardson (1990) While British steel workers had a less confrontational history than other labour groups such as the coal miners, they also struggled to self-organize, thereby crippling any attempt at a united response to BSC's re-structuring of the company. According to steel unions at the time, the changing working conditions eroded workers' sense of identity and resulted in a weakened sense of community. 58 The weakening state of steel unions is reflected in the outcome of the Employee Director Scheme.
While optimistic in theory, the scheme was highly problematic in practice and was ultimately cancelled in 1983. Dudley and Richards (1990) quote Brennan, who describes the problems inherent in the scheme, Worker directors of necessity enter worlds already established in both of formal roles and processes of custom and practice, of values and language.
The social dynamics of those worlds strongly favor the encapsulation of worker directors within the pre-existing boardroom ethos and organization and within though in a limited way, the pre-existing organizational categories of information and analysis. 59 56 Dudley and Richardson (1990), Politics and Steel in Britain, p. 46. 57 Ibid. 58 Dudley and Richardson (1990), Politics and Steel in Britain, p. 47. 59 Dudley and Richardson (1990) From Evans' description and his later public sculpture in Cardiff, we can arguably discern a loyalty but often romanticized relationship to the working class, an appreciation of hard labour and a sense of community that initially deterred him from committing to work professionally as an artist. It was not until Evans was stationed in Hong Kong as part of the British Military that he was convinced to commit to art production and teaching. 65 Evans' description of his military service and education includes him in a post-World War II generation of artists from working class backgrounds who were enabled by these experiences to pursue careers in the arts. However, as these individuals entered art school, and later became teachers, they increasingly expressed a loyalty to, or a desire to conceptually and aesthetically reconnect with, their working-class heritage. Such a cultural trend has been theorized by American Fredric Jameson as a phenomenon of working-class guilt. As Jameson (1991) states, this individual 'is forever suspended between classes, yet unable to disengage from class realities and functions, and from class guilt.' 66 In American sculpture, this trend has been the subject of art historian Julia Bryan-Wilson's Art Workers (2009) and Alex Potts' The Sculptural Imagination: Figurative, Modernist, Minimalist (2000), which discuss the work of sculptor Carl Andre who was active during the same time period as Evans. (2009)  Britain's post-war politics were defined by an aggressive upward social mobility plan, an optimism that was contingent on the promises of the UK's Welfare State to take care of its citizens. This promise was epitomized in the 1942 Beveridge Report's slogan, 'from the cradle to the grave we will look out for you,' a utopic vision that Along with the increased accessibility of consumer goods, a parallel initiative occurred in the mass production of secondary school education, known as the comprehensive revolution, which not only made education more accessible, but it also introduced students to a greater variety of subjects, including art. 73 Consequently, as consumer goods made their way into more households, so did greater options in education, creating opportunities for members of the working class to 'move up'.

Bryan-Wilson
Evans' exposure to art and his ability to attend art school were direct results of these reforms.
The belief in the ability of these policies to create upward social mobility at the time was so extreme that it would fundamentally change approaches to and perceptions of working class character. British historian John Kirk's Class, Culture and Social Change: On the Trail of the Working Class observes that it was largely assumed by the intelligentsia that the post-war working class was on the brink of disappearance-a myth, Kirk argues, that motivated E.P. Thompson and others to obsessively document working class culture in the 1950s and 60s. 74 However, as Kirk recounts, the working class did not disappear, but instead changed shape in the public's perception. In his seminal text, A Phenomenology of the Working Class Experience (1999), Simon Charlesworth describes this shift during the 1960s and 70s as ' a deep existential gulf between those reared in an industrial past and those for whom this culture now stands as some sort of folk-lore, a folklore that stands contrary to their existence in the present. The image of working class culture that Evans had constructed from his childhood had become corroded by consumption and individualism, and was largely thought to have disappeared in Britain's social imagination. Evans was faced with the problem of rectifying his nostalgic narrative of his pre-war working-class heritage with these changing post-war conditions and perceptions of his contemporary working class.
These conflicting identities inevitably pressured Evans to negotiate his own class position and allegiances while at BSC.
Despite the publication of Some Steel, Evans kept returning to his studio determined to make a sculpture. The photographs that compose the publication and the many others, such as the apprentice object photographs, were ultimately unable to embody the scale of his experience at BSC. This motivated Evans to reflect on his practice and cultivate a perspective that cultural theorists such as Bertolt Brecht shared decades earlier when they argued that direct representations of factory life, such as photography, were inadequate. For example in Brecht's essays, On Film and Radio (1919Radio ( -1956, he states that human socio-economic experience was now reified in its relationship to capitalism. As a result, the individual's experience was no longer readily available to capture. It was now fragmented and needed to be reconstructed. 78 Brecht's suspicion of photography was reiterated by Carl Andre in 1968 (during the early stages of Evans's placement) when he exclaimed, 'The photograph is a lie … this is anti-art because art is a direct experience with something in the world, and allowed him to learn the hierarchy of material, to navigate levels of labour and, ultimately, introduced him to the problem of his placement: how to convey the material and subsequently the labour conditions of an individual working within capitalist modes of production.
In addition to taking photographs of the apprentice's objects, Evans proposed a project to work collaboratively with the apprentices. This proposal, like all of his proposals to collaborate or work on the factory floor, was ultimately denied by BSC on the grounds of it being too dangerous for the artist. 80 However through his attempts to collaborate, Evans did learn that the apprentice program was largely in decline; working as an apprentice no longer secured a job. 81 From the archival material, it is unclear in how much detail Evans knew about the relationship between the lack of job security of the apprentices and the larger restructuring of BSC. However, in letters to Kenneth Robinson, Director of Social Policy at BSC in 1971, Evans does express his concern over the negative implications of the corporation's changing social policy, specifically listing: boredom in the workplace, the effect of mundane tasks on the worker's psyche, and the methods of education used within the factory. Evans states that, '[industry] needs to be concerned with and allocate resources in a deliberate attempt to engage the interest of their participants … an industrial undertaking requires for its own efficiency to include in that description of its function, the idea that it exists to provide a meaningful experience of work.' 82 Evans concludes that the success and efficiency of industry rests on the quality of the work experience and the creative engagement of its employees. If industries fail to do this, Evans states, 'I believe that the industrial enterprise, taken as a whole will become increasingly unworkable, in that it has to give impossible financial substitutes for its failure to provide a meaningful experience of work, and to cope 80 There is some disputed evidence in the archive and interviews with Evans and other APG artists that suggest Evans may have gotten the apprentices to at least fill out surveys about their status and experience at the British Steel Corporation. However, in a recent interview with Carmen Morsch, Evans states he never spoke to them directly; see Morsch (2019), Incidentally in Context. p. 139. 81 Garth Evans (1970), "Garth Evans-British Steel Report." Tate Archive, Tate Museum, London. I would like to take time off to debate the major issue of job satisfaction in industry and particularly in industry, which is of a routine productive nature. The problem you pose is not unrecognized… What is more difficult is suggesting one (or more) solutions. … I do believe that advancement in technology increases the proportion of tedious work but reduces the number who have to undertake such tedious work.
My main concern is that, however the artist may work, (whether intuitively or otherwise) unless the method by which you hope to raise the level of interest for the worker within the industry is propounded in terms which they (the workers-management and men) feel they have an understanding of what you are after, your mission will fail. It is in this respect that I found both your memos deficient. The intent is good, the mode of attack on the problem less satisfying. 85 83 Garth Evans (1971) Finiston's response echoes Bryan-Wilson's critique of Andre, suggesting that the artist's elite status or way of communicating makes any critique of worker's conditions problematic and, further, hypocritical. Evans himself conceded these criticisms, claiming that he too felt some lack of conviction in his proposition.
In response, however, Evans chose to focus his criticism on a smaller scale. He specifically advised adjustments to the work and safety films. Evans was shown a total of nine films from the corporation film library as part of his introduction to BSC. 86 One of primary interest was a trainee film on electric arc furnaces (as mentioned earlier, electric arc furnaces were one of the main technological developments that caused small factories at BSC to close). Evans' primary concern with the film was its production. He argued that BSC's production style disconnected the processes of hearing and seeing.
In recent interviews, Evans more specifically equates his experience with the BSC films with his time in the military. He states they both brought on a similar feeling of inefficient manipulation; that is, as Evans states, 'being manipulated in the sense of being put in a position where you are supposed to be drawn in and enlightened and made part of something but actually at the same time being separated from it.' 87 As a result, according to Evans, not only was BSC's message lost on trainees, but instead of creating a sense of shared interests, the film felt isolating. Evans's focus on the trainee films therefore served to channel his criticality of BSC labour practices to a specific focus on communications. Evans states: 'In my visits to steel works I have been fascinated by the means of obtaining and communicating information … The noise of the machinery makes oral communications.' 88 The role of communications in the factory later inspired Evans' proposal for the APG's exhibition that documented its placements (Hayward Gallery, 1972 Evans (1970), "Notes on Trainee Films." of the BSC training films. Evans requested closed circuit televisions, telephone links, cables to loudspeakers and computers with print outs to be placed throughout the gallery space. 89 While the invited BSC representatives left early and his request to channel live sound from the BSC factory floor would be denied due to BSC's concerns over workers' language, what the plan and eventual form of installation shows us is the use of communication to draw a connection between material and labour. The 'noise of the machine' was its own form of communication amongst a background of workers and management voices. Caro's musical score of composing steel sculpture is thus redefined as a cacophony of material, mechanical and human voices that make up a factory floor.
Evans' intuitive concern with communications at BSC can be considered symptomatic of the waning optimism and subsequent erosion of productive

Breakdown
In 1971, shortly after Evans completed his placement with BSC, he welded and rewelded together the sets of steel that he had rearranged throughout his placement.  Reproduced with permission from Garth Evans.
Significantly, Tucker also participated in a fellowship at Leeds University at roughly the same time as Evans' placement with BSC, a coincidence that Hulks credits to more artists turning to fellowships as academic positions became scarcer.
The prominent art publication at the time, Studio International, published a letter exchange between Tucker and Evans discussing the different approaches to their fellowships. Within his letter Evans points to an important distinction between his work and Tucker's, as Hulks (2013)  Hulks largely credits the difference between Tucker and Evans' perception of a new reality for art making and, subsequently, the crisis culminating in Breakdown, to the personal pressure that Evans felt to be more socially engaged with his practice.
However, the factors of Evans' placement arguably crafted a new reality that was significantly different from his expectations. If, according to Hulks, Evans felt pressure to be more socially engaged, how did this new social role transpire and how did it affect composition?
During his placement, Evans encountered a context riddled with contradictions: materials that did not fit into the modes of production; a community that did not fit his image of the working class; and a shifting corporate policy that deemed these materials and people obsolete in a Welfare State that had promised full employment.
I argue that he began to grapple with this reality in his photographs of the apprentice objects and brings this to some conclusion in Breakdown. 93 Hulks (2013), Breakdown. p. 58.
In interviews, Evans states that the title, Breakdown, referenced his inability to create a sculpture during his placement and reflected a general trepidation he felt about being a sculptor at that time. Evans' anxiety was so great that he recalls he sought psychological counselling at the time of his placement. 94  Fredric Jameson describes the radicality of the cultural object as drawing 'the real into its own texture and … its paradoxes.' 97 The subject of Breakdown is similarly formed by drawing the outside in. Evans ' (1968) words echo this sentiment when he describes the artist's ideal role during a placement: 'I have in mind someone who is not primarily concerned with producing things that are easily identifiable (as art) but one whose concern includes the conventions by which we classify experience, the social and conceptual framework through which our experience is received. ' 98 To reiterate Evans' description, '[w]hat happens to sculpture is largely determined by factors outside of itself.' However, this is not solely credited to a greater social responsibility. When he refers to the naiveté of Tucker's autonomy, Evans is not abandoning autonomy, but instead is redefining the problem of composition from painterly abstraction to terms of mediation. Therefore, a more socially engaged artist can be described as one who maneuvers through the contradictory strands of Evans' placement experience; or, perhaps more accurately, one who comes to terms with the failure of mediating these conditions and who assess the way this failure ultimately materializes, as in the broken totality of Breakdown's frayed steel grid. Unable to separate himself from the object, Breakdown ultimately embodies the struggle that Evans experienced while navigating between the material of steel and aesthetic form, between the changing structure of BSC and the individual worker, and between his own conflicting relationships to class. Breakdown draws in the real so much that it is ultimately the breakdown of the artists' ability to negotiate between himself and the varying scales of capitalism. In a letter to curator Jasia Reichardt written in 1980, Evans reflects, 'I wished to stop making objects, but I did not wish to stop being a sculptor … '. 99