Lithograph on paper
Tate Collection
Works with images
General Collection
Posters from the Little Spartan War
Collection
<a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/ian-hamilton-finlay-1093" aria-label="More by Ian Hamilton Finlay" data-gtm-name="header_link_artist" data-gtm-destination="page--artist">Ian Hamilton Finlay</a>
Peace to Cottages  War to Arts Council
Purchased 1983
abstraction
government and politics
inscriptions
Latin text
non-representational
political protest
society
symbols and personifications
text
paper print lithograph
17 September 2002 – 13 October 2002
2002-10-13
17 September 2002 – 13 October 2002
2002-10-13
2002-09-17
Gallery  (Lincoln, UK)
2002-09-17
Tate Unseen
Loan-out
Peace to the Cottages - War to the Arts Council
image: 302 × 432 mm
Purchased 1983
<p><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/finlay-peace-to-the-cottages-war-to-the-arts-council-p07930" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07930</span></a> [from] <b>Posters from the Little Spartan War</b> 1982 [<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/finlay-the-arts-council-must-be-utterly-destroyed-p07927" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07927</span></a>-<span>P07930</span>; complete]
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<br/>Four linocuts each approx. 12 × 17 (305 × 432), printed by Nicholas Sloan at Parrett Press, Martock, and published by the Wild Hawthorn Press in an edition of about 100
<br/>Not inscribed
<br/>Purchased from the artist (Grant-in-Aid) 1983
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<br/><span>P07927</span>
<br/>The Arts Council Must be Utterly Destroyed
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<br/><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/finlay-death-to-the-arts-council-p07928" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07928</span></a>
<br/>Death to the Arts Council
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<br/><a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/finlay-let-perish-the-money-tyrants-p07929" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07929</span></a>
<br/>Let Perish the Money Tyrants</p>
<p></p>
<p><span>P07930</span>
<br/>Peace to the Cottages - War to the Arts Council
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<br/>Each poster is a Latin text, cut and printed by Nicholas Sloan. They are, respectively: ‘CONCILIUM/ ARTUM/DELENDUM/EST’, ‘MORS/CONCILIO/ ARTUM/’, ‘PEREANT/TYRANNI/NUMMARI’ and ‘PAX. TUGURIIS/BELLUM. CONC/ARTIUM’; the translations are the artist's. In 1982, as part of Finlay's campaign against Strathclyde Region's attempts to extract rates for the Temple in his garden on the fallacious basis of it being a commercial gallery, these printed texts were fly-posted on the Scottish National Gallery, the Scottish Arts Council building and other places in Edinburgh. They were accompanied by a leaflet on revolutionary language alluding to Denis Roche, the poet who wrote a pamphlet on language and the French Revolution. The use of Latin here <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/a/allegory" title="Glossary definition for 'Allegory'"><span>allegorises</span></a> the <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/n/neoclassicism" title="Glossary definition for 'Neoclassicism'"><span>neo-classical</span></a> attitudes of Finlay and his supporters, the Sainte-Just Vigilantes. According to Finlay, <a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/c/classicism" title="Glossary definition for 'Classicism'"><span>classicism</span></a> supplied the entire ‘<a class="glossarylinktopopup" data-gtm-destination="article-page" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/i/iconography" title="Glossary definition for 'Iconography'"><span>iconography</span></a>’ of the French Revolution, which he has even described as ‘a pastoral whose Virgil was Rousseau’. Two quotations from Finlay's ‘Illustrated Dictionary of the Little Spartan War’ (MW Magazine, Issue 3, February 1983) are relevant here: ‘Neoclassicism, n. - a rearmament programme for architecture and the arts’ (illustrated by a classical capital) and ‘inscription, n. - an arcane communication often coded in Latin’ (illustrated with one of the War Posters). ‘Peace to the Cottages’ is based on an actual slogan used by the Revolutionaries: ‘Peace to the Cottages - War on the Castles’. ‘The Arts Council Must be Utterly Destroyed’ is derived from a phrase Cato would add to the end of every speech as a reference to his hatred of Carthage. The shortening of words as in ‘CONC’ follows normal usage in Roman inscriptions.
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<br/>This and the following entries [<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/phillips-canto-ii-no-title-p07625" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07625</span></a>-<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/chia-about-the-unseizable-p07634" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07634</span></a> and <a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/finlay-sailing-barge-redwing-p07645" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07645</span></a>-<a class="acno-pop" data-gtm-destination="page--artwork" data-gtm-name="body_text_link" href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/finlay-homage-to-agam-p07647" title="View the details of this artwork"><span>P07647</span></a>] have all been approved by the artist.
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<br/><b>Published in:</b>
<br/><i>The Tate Gallery 1982-84: Illustrated Catalogue of Acquisitions</i>, London 1986
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<br/>
<br/></p>

Catalogue entry
2004-10-13T00:00:00
catalogue-entry
CATALOGUE_ENTRY
abstraction government and politics inscriptions Latin text non-representational political protest society symbols and personifications text