Tag: Australian art
Idris Murphy
Tuesday, March 14th, 2023 Art Column,In this country some of our greatest artists, such as Drysdale and Dobell, faced a long struggle for institutional recognition, followed by a rush of success when everyone jumped on the bandwagon. In recent years there’s been a different pattern, with younger artists singled out as fashionable stars whose work is collected early by all […]
Jeffrey Smart: ‘Petrol Station’ (1975)
Friday, March 10th, 2023 Journals,JEFFREY SMART Petrol Station 1975 oil on canvas on board 34.5 x 39.5 cm signed lower left: JEFFREY SMART Provenance: South Yarra Gallery, Melbourne (label attached verso) Private collection, Melbourne Leonard Joel, Melbourne, 4 November 1981, lot 25 Private collection, Melbourne Exhibited: (Probably) Jeffrey Smart, South Yarra Gallery, Melbourne, 3 April 1975 (Or) Jeffrey Smart, South […]
Jeffrey Smart: First Study for Waiting for the Hovercraft, Boulogne (1986-87)
Friday, March 10th, 2023 Journals,JEFFREY SMART (1921-2013) First Study for Waiting For the Hovercraft, Boulogne 1986-87 oil on paper on canvas 32.5 x 45.0 cm signed lower left: JEFFREY SMART Provenance: Australian Galleries, Melbourne Private collection, Melbourne Deutscher-Menzies, Sydney, 4 March 2003, lot 76 (as Second Study for ‘Waiting For the Hovercraft, Boulogne’ ) Ronald Coles, Sydney Acquired from the above, private […]
Peter Booth
Tuesday, March 7th, 2023 Art Column,There can be few exhibitions in Australia that have shocked viewers as thoroughly as Peter Booth’s show at Melbourne’s Pinacotheca Gallery in late 1977. The most telling comparison might be with American painter, Philip Guston, whose 1970 show at Marlborough Galleries, New York, was greeted with scorn by leading critics, including Robert Hughes. In both […]
Air
Tuesday, January 31st, 2023 Art Column,Some people say not to worry about the air Some people never had experience with… air Talking Heads Science tells us the average human being takes in 360 litres of air per hour. That sounds like a lot, but we do it without even noticing. It’s only when we have trouble breathing or […]
Spowers & Syme
Tuesday, January 24th, 2023 Art Column,Spowers & Syme may sound like a firm of accountants, but we’re dealing with an entirely different order of creativity. Ethel Spowers (1890-1947), and Eveline Syme (1888-1961), were groundbreaking Australian artists at a time when women found it difficult to make any impression on an art scene dominated by self-confident and self-serving males. A touring […]
One Week in the Pilbara
Saturday, January 7th, 2023 Blog,“What do you think of the Pilbara?” asked the hotel manager in Newman. “A lot of red dirt?” The immediate answer was: “Yes. A vast, seemingly endless expanse of red dirt, criss-crossed by trains carrying identically formed hillocks of iron ore. The trains stretch for kilometres at a time. You see them on the horizon, […]
2022 and Beyond
Monday, January 2nd, 2023 Art Column,There’s been plenty to think about in 2022, including war in the Ukraine, a looming global recession and floods along the north coast, but if one had to nominate Australia’s most momentous event of the year it would have to be the change of government. Whether this was equally momentous for the visual arts remains […]
Fred Williams, Werribee Gorge (10)(1977-78)
Friday, December 16th, 2022 Journals,By the time he discovered Werribee Gorge, in 1977, Fred Williams had nothing left to prove. He was the country’s leading landscape painter, and one of the most highly respected figures in Australian art. He sat on the Acquisitions Committee of the Australian National Gallery, as it was then known, and had served as a […]
Jeffrey Smart, Study I for Bus Terminus (1972-73)
Friday, December 16th, 2022 Journals,A painting by Jeffrey Smart might begin with a sudden epiphany, a flash of inspiration found by the side of the road. Smart would make a quick sketch, and maybe a snapshot, then store the motif on an imaginary shelf, awaiting its day in the studio. At this point, the hard work would begin. An […]