Avant-Garde

Taking months to complete, these works are not only a vibrant and passionate artwork on canvas but David has also used the same
technique to paint the black dog, which is a twist on his 8 Black Dog series.

Bogart the “Black Dog” has gone ahead of the painting to enter the world as a three dimensional object, but still remains close
by, to watch over the artwork and guard it.

Avant-Garde is originally a French term, meaning in English vanguard or advance guard (the part of an army that goes forward ahead of the rest). It first appeared with reference to art in France in the first half of the nineteenth century, and is usually credited to the influential thinker Henri de Saint-Simon, one of the forerunners of socialism. He believed in the social power of the arts and saw artists, alongside scientists and industrialists, as the leaders of a new society. In 1825 he wrote:
“We artists will serve you as an avant-garde, the power of the arts is most immediate: when we want to spread new ideas we inscribe them on marble or canvas. What a magnificent destiny for the arts is that of exercising a positive power over society, a true priestly function and of marching in the van [i.e. vanguard] of all the intellectual faculties!”