''The Great Bear'' is a 1992 lithograph by Simon Patterson. At first glance the work looks like the

London Underground The London Underground (also known simply as the Underground or by its nickname the Tube) is a rapid transit system serving Greater London and some parts of the adjacent counties of Buckinghamshire, Essex and Hertfordshire in England. The ...

Tube map The Tube map (sometimes called the London Underground map) is a schematic transport map of the lines, stations and services of the London Underground, known colloquially as "the Tube", hence the map's name. The first schematic Tube map was des ...

, but Patterson uses each line to represent groups of people, including

scientist A scientist is a person who conducts scientific research to advance knowledge in an area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, philosophers engaged in the philosoph ...

s, saints, philosophers, comedians,

explorer Exploration refers to the historical practice of discovering remote lands. It is studied by geographers and historians. Two major eras of exploration occurred in human history: one of convergence, and one of divergence. The first, covering most ...

s and

footballers A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby ...

. The copyright of the work is shared between the artist and London Underground from whom the artist obtained permission after protracted negotiation. A copy of ''The Great Bear'' can be found in the

Tate Gallery Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its main sponsor is the U ...

. The work is in an edition of 50 with a small additional number of artist's proofs.

Responses

Ian Russell, writing in ''Images, representations and heritage: moving beyond modern approaches to archaeology'' in 2006, felt that the map emphasises that "the tube map distorts and masks realities". Social historian Joe Moran wrote in his 2005 work ''Reading the Everyday'' that the map "suggests that the tube map has become its own reality, entirely abstracted from the work it ostensibly represents". David Pike, author of 'Modernist Space and the Transformation of Underground London', expressed his belief that Patterson "discovered the dreams of modernism within the world of the 1990s in the same way that he found the dreams of the present lurking within the modernist space of Harry Beck's underground map", comparing the work to the writing of

Iain Sinclair Iain Sinclair FRSL (born 11 June 1943) is a writer and filmmaker. Much of his work is rooted in London, recently within the influences of psychogeography. Biography Education Sinclair was born in Cardiff in 1943. From 1956 to 1961, he was educate ...

and the artwork of

Mark Dion Mark Dion (born August 28, 1961) is an American conceptual artist best known for his use of scientific presentations in his installations. His work examines the manner in which prevalent ideologies and institutions influence our understanding ...

References

External links

The Great Bear (detail)The Great Bear in the Tate Collection
Lithographs 1992 works Transport design in London London Underground in popular culture {{UK-metro-stub