Newsletter
Newsletter 541
Sunday, June 2nd, 2024 Newsletter,Whenever the visual arts become a source of controversy or scandal I can expect calls from radio stations and newspapers around Australia. Needless to say, Gina Rinehart’s complaint about the Vincent Namatjira portrait made the phone ran hot. The most recent topic that brought a flurry of calls was Steven Bostock’s entry in the 2024 […]
Newsletter 540
Monday, May 20th, 2024 Newsletter,It’s impossible to avoid the most pathetic art story of the week, Gina Rinehart’s request/demand that the National Gallery of Australia take down a portrait painted by Vincent Namatjira, currently being exhibited in a survey exhibition. Ms. Rinehart could not do anything but score an own goal with this bit of peevishness, because it’s an […]
Newsletter 539
Monday, May 13th, 2024 Newsletter,We can still take heart that we’re not as crazy as the Americans, but it’s not for want of trying. Last week’s bizarre story that the Cumberland City Council in Western Sydney, had banned all books on same-sex parenting from eight public libraries, was met with scorn and incredulity. The ban was narrowly passed: six […]
Newsletter 538
Thursday, May 9th, 2024 Newsletter,There’s such a flood of propaganda coming from the Powerhouse Museum, I can barely bring myself to look at it. That, I presume, would be a highly desirable outcome for PHM director, Lisa Havilah; NSW Arts Minister, John Graham, and everyone else who’s involved in the business of full-scale cultural vandalism. We know from the […]
Newsletter 537
Monday, April 29th, 2024 Newsletter,Just when I decide it’s too hard to get to the vernissage of this year’s Venice Biennale, Australia wins the Golden Lion! It came as a surprise, but it’s also a great occasion. For once – perhaps the first time ever – we managed to get it right. Archie Moore may have simply beaten down […]
Newsletter 536
Monday, April 22nd, 2024 Newsletter,By the time you read this I should be back from my travels, watering the garden, trying to reset my biological clock to Sydney time. I’ve missed the horrendous knife attack at Bondi Junction and the gruesome farce of Bruce Lehrmann’s defamation case – the two Australian news items that are all over the Internet. […]
Newsletter 535
Friday, April 19th, 2024 Newsletter,If you’re wondering what happened to this newsletter, I’m afraid it has been subject to entirely human problems. That is, as a one-man band, I simply haven’t had time to sit down and contemplate writing a piece. I’ve been travelling pretty much non-stop for more than two weeks, and I’m still in the thick of […]
Newsletter 534
Monday, March 25th, 2024 Newsletter,It made for unsettling reading last week to find that a pro-Palestinian activist had slashed a portrait of Lord Balfour and sprayed red paint all over it, as a “protest”. The portrait, in the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, was by Philip de Lázsló (1869-1937) a Hungarian-born artist known for his paintings of aristocrats and socialites. […]
Newsletter 533
Monday, March 18th, 2024 Newsletter,As if confirmation were needed that the United States has completely lost touch with reality, last week bought three startling images. First up we had Alabama Senator, Katie Britt, delivering a reply to Joe Biden’s State of the Union address, so weird it defied parody (although Scarlett Johansson would give it a go on Saturday […]
Newsletter 532
Monday, March 11th, 2024 Newsletter,Coming home from Art Dubai and the Diriyah Biennale in Saudi Arabia, the first story I read in the local press was Linda Morris’s report on the Art Gallery of NSW preparing to slash 30 jobs to cope with a budget shortfall of some $4 million. Read on, and one learns this means 10 full-time […]