PHIL MAXWELL

In the 1960s, when public libraries were plentiful, I would spend hours at the central reference library in Coventry looking through service manuals for electrical appliances. I was fascinated by how Radios, TVs and tape recorders worked and I would bury my head into manuals containing circuit diagrams. On reflection I don’t think I was any the wiser regarding the science behind the appliances we all took for granted but I was drawn to the circuit diagrams and illustrations that were a guide to engineers who used to repair equipment before the era where everything was just thrown away and replaced with an ‘improved’ model. Probably the diagrams resonated with the technical drawing I was studying and attempting to do at school at the time.

I recently discovered a book – ‘Radio and TV Servicing 1970-71 Models’ at a nearby charity shop. It immediately pulled me back to my youth and my attraction to circuit diagrams. The 50p I paid for the book was the cheapest nostalgia trip I’ve experienced. Now I understand I was drawn to the strange beauty of the diagrams because they also reminded me of road maps and the mysterious inscriptions on ancient Egyptian monuments, tombs and buildings. I immediately went to work in incorporating the diagrams into some artwork.

The woman with the trolley bag is embellished with a major invention during her life time: the cathode ray tube to which which I’ve added the lens of an early 20th century camera (which preceded television). The short time, in historic terms, of the existence of beguiling electrical diagrams with valves and other pre miniaturised cicuitry hardly competes with the power of ancient Egyptian iconagraphy but it still has a visual allure which deserves the interest of artists.