Sydney Morning Herald Column
Les Sculpture Refusées & Sculpture in the Vineyards – Wollombi Valley Sculpture Festival
Tuesday, October 27th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,At this time of any other year Sydney is getting ready for its regular fix of Sculpture by the Sea (SXS), one of the most eagerly anticipated events on the cultural calendar. But like so many things in the era of COVID-19, the thought of hundreds of thousands of people rubbing shoulders on the trail […]
Lindy Lee: Moon in a Dew Drop
Tuesday, October 20th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,Lindy Lee grew up in Brisbane in the 1960s, the daughter of Chinese parents who left Guandong when the Communists came to power. She is ethnically Chinese but Australian born and bred, a duality that has coloured her entire life. She remembers being the only Chinese face in her classes at school, which meant she […]
Salon des Refusés 2020
Tuesday, October 13th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,There must be a limit to the industrial quantity of portraits served up annually to the Australian public. This year we’ve already had the Portia Geach Memorial Award at the S.H.Ervin; the Shirley Hannan National Portrait Award in Bega; the National Photographic Portrait Prize and the Darling Portrait Prize at the National Portrait Gallery in […]
Archibald Prize 2020: A Trilogy
Tuesday, October 6th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,The Archibald Prize 2020: A First Look Scomo is out, but Albo is in. And so is Jacinda Adern. If the Art Gallery of NSW were not a steadfastly apolitical institution, one might imagine there is some comment intended in the selection of finalists for the 2020 Archibald Prize. In olden days a portrait […]
Endeavour Voyage
Tuesday, September 29th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,In the Bicentenary celebrations of 1970 Captain Cook was hailed as the discoverer of Australia. At primary school we received a special booklet telling us about the great navigator and his achievements. There were commemorative coins, badges and postage stamps. Every form of sporting competition had its dedication to Cook – from surf life-saving to […]
James Rogers
Tuesday, September 22nd, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,Some artists make their best impression in a group exhibition, others need a showcase to themselves. James Rogers is a sculptor who always seems to have one of the standout pieces in Sculpture By the Sea every year. I felt I knew his work pretty well, but his mid-career survey at the Drill Hall Gallery […]
Koo Bohnchang
Tuesday, September 15th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,“In matters of art,” wrote the erudite poet, Paul Valéry, “erudition is a sort of defeat.” The argument is that the freshness of first perceptions may be destroyed by specialised knowledge. Imagine, for example, an expert on ceramics standing in front of a great piece of pottery. There are questions about where and when the […]
Angus Nivison, Paul Higgs
Tuesday, September 8th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,If one had to nominate the most high-profile show in Sydney this week, it would probably be Patricia Piccinini’s The Gardener at Roslyn Oxley9. Touted as the most popular contemporary artist in the world in 2106, after two well-attended surveys in Brazil, Piccinini has become a favourite with the art museums. One might compare her […]
Khaled Sabsabi: A Promise
Wednesday, September 2nd, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,After the Lebanese civil war an elegant apartment block in Beirut, known locally as the Yellow House, was left disfigured by gaping holes, every surface scarred by bullets. Scheduled for demolition it was saved by a 1994 heritage campaign. Today the building has been artfully restored and turned into a cultural centre called Beit Beirut […]
Portia Geach Memorial Award 2020
Tuesday, August 25th, 2020 Sydney Morning Herald Column,Not even a pandemic can dampen down Australia’s love of art prizes. On the contrary, it’s possible the lockdown has inflamed this monstrous passion, as artists have found themselves in the studio for extended periods with no distractions. Perhaps we’ll soon have an oversupply of art to go with the oversupply of investment units. Those […]