Art Column
After The Duke
Tuesday, April 5th, 2022 Art Column,Everyone loves a heist movie. But from Rififi to Ocean’s Eleven, from Topkapi to Le Cercle Rouge, there’s never been a film about a major art theft quite like The Duke. Roger Michell’s comedy-drama about an eccentric working-class hero with a hyperactive social conscience, is only incidentally a crime story. Nevertheless, it tells us something […]
Adelaide Biennial 2022: Free/State
Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 Art Column,Sebastian Goldspink is pioneering a new model of curatorship – the sensitive, caring custodian. At the opening of the 2022 Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art at the Art Gallery of South Australia, Goldspink seemed to waver on the brink of tears every time he had to make a speech, which, as guest curator, was pretty […]
23rd Sydney Biennale: A Brief Guide
Tuesday, March 15th, 2022 Art Column,Preparations for the 23rd Biennale of Sydney were well underway before somebody noticed this year’s theme – rīvus – was an anagram of “virus”. For director, José Roca, who has worked to assemble a vast international show in a locked-down world, it would have been impossible to ignore the pandemic. Roca is from Columbia but […]
Where to now for the MCA?
Tuesday, March 8th, 2022 Art Column,A change is always an opportunity, and Sydney’s Museum of Contemporary Art is set to begin a new chapter with the departure of longterm director, Elizabeth-Ann Macgregor and senior curator, Rachel Kent. Yet the transition has been complicated by two years of pandemic, and the impending opening of the Art Gallery of NSW’s Sydney Modern […]
Ancient Greeks: Athletes, Warriors and Heroes
Tuesday, March 1st, 2022 Art Column,Plato believed the ideal city should have 5,000 citizens, which is roughly the population of Double Bay. I mention this curious fact to make a point about the ancient Greeks. They may have come up with all the grand ideas behind western civilisation, but their daily lives were conducted on a scale that would be […]
White Rabbit: Big in China
Tuesday, February 22nd, 2022 Art Column,It seems that everything is big in China apart from the Olympic flame. In a country in which the number of people and the staggering pace of development are overwhelming, it was surprising that the opening ceremonies of the Beijing Winter Olympics ended with two athletes placing a teensy-weensy flame into a giant-sized snowflake. I […]
Destination Sydney 2022
Tuesday, February 15th, 2022 Art Column,As a title, Destination Sydney, is not sounding any better with age, but this third installment of the show is reputedly the last. As with the exhibitions in 2015 and 2018, it’s a collaboration between three of Sydney’s leading public venues: the S.H. Ervin Gallery, Mosman Art Gallery, and the Manly Museum and Art Gallery, […]
Gabrielle Chanel: Fashion Manifesto
Thursday, February 10th, 2022 Art Column,“I am not a heroine,” Gabrielle Chanel told one of her biographers. “But I have chosen the person I wanted to be and am. Too bad if I am disliked and unpleasant.” Like most things this famous couturiere said, this statement requires unpacking. Madame Chanel could be extremely unpleasant, but also wildly generous. She was […]
Matisse: Life & Spirit
Tuesday, January 25th, 2022 Art Column,Unless you’ve been watching the Ashes there’s not a lot to be cheerful about at the beginning of this year. To go – literally – anywhere is to be sure of receiving a COVID-19 notification, but if you’re willing to take your chances with at least one exhibition in Sydney, it would have to be […]
Five Hundred Arhats
Tuesday, January 18th, 2022 Art Column,All Buddhists aim to achieve enlightenment but only Prince Gautama, the Buddha himself, attained Nirvana by his own efforts. Everyone else requires help – a spiritual need recognised by both major schools of Buddhism, the Hinayana (AKA. the Lesser Way) and the Mahayana (the Greater Way). The Mahayana has its bodhisattvas – enlightened beings who […]