Deakin University Art Collection: A Selection of Works

DEAKIN UNIVERSITY ART COLLECTION

A SELECTION OF WORKS

DEAKIN UNIVERSITY ART COLLECTION

A SELECTION OF WORKS

Deakin acknowledges the Wadawurrung and Wurrunderji peoples of the Kulin nation and the Gunditjmara people, who are the traditional custodians of the lands on which our campuses are based. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present and thank them for their care of the land.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be aware that this publication may contain images or names of people who have since passed away.

INTRODUCTION

It gives me great pleasure to welcome you to a very special preview of Deakin University’s Art Collection. The Collection has been in existence since the University’s inception and represents works of excellence and significance in a wide range of mediums, principally by Australian contemporary artists. Maintaining and growing this Collection demonstrates the University’s interest in the study, patronage and advancement of the visual arts in Australia. In recent years we have been able to particularly focus on increasing our representation of Indigenous works for display. The result was some wonderful acquisitions by significant Indigenous artists which we felt very privileged to acquire.

In the ten years I have been at Deakin I have worked with dedicated professional staff who have helped shape the Collection into the cultural treasure it is today. Curators past and present have included Victor Griss, Emma Busowsky Cox and James Lynch; Art Collection Officers have included Claire Muir and Roxanna Richens. It has been a pleasure and privilege to work with such a wonderful group of people.

Other staff who have supported the Collection development have included Professor Brenda Cherednichenko, Executive Dean, Faculty of Arts and Education; Liz Cameron, Director, Institute of Koorie Education; Ron Fairchild, Chief Advancement Officer; Kean Selway, Chief Operating Officer, Kevin Murphy, Executive Officer; Facilities Services Division and Michael Mangos, Director Stakeholder Partnerships and Community Relations. I thank them, and our Advancement colleagues, for their assistance and support of this publication.

wish to also acknowledge Professor Jane den Hollander AO, Vice-Chancellor of Deakin University. Her exemplary leadership and depth of insight and knowledge is inspirational across the University community. The growth of the Collection owes a great deal to her leadership and foresight.

Contained within this publication are texts giving voice to some of the many people from across the University community and beyond who have contributed to the development of the Art Collection, or who have connected with it in a meaningful way. I invite you to join us on a journey through the art on display around campus and a preview of some of the other works contained within the University’s Art Collection.

The Collection continues to grow and change through both the generous support of our donors and by acquisition. The vast majority of the Collection is on public display throughout Deakin’s four physical campuses at Geelong Waurn Ponds, Geelong Waterfront, Warrnambool and Melbourne Burwood; the Werribee Learning Centre and Corporate Centres including Deakin Downtown and Waurn Ponds Estate. I encourage you to take the opportunity to to visit and view the variety and ever changing treasures in the Deakin University Art Collection.

Leanne Willis Manager, Art Collection and Galleries Deakin University

Konstantin Dimopoulos Red Field 2014

Guy Boyd

Leda and the Swan 1988

Gift of the artist, 1988

Casting

Right: Melbourne Burwood Campus

Opposite: Geelong Waurn Ponds Campus

costs provided by Friends of Deakin, 1988

Peter Blizzard

Female Fertility Totem 2007

Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Jim Cousins AO and Libby Cousins, 2015

Opposite: Warrnambool Campus

Chris Booth Tuuram Cairn 1996

Right: Geelong Waterfront Campus

Bowathay (Mungandjiwuy) Munyarryan

Freshwater Lobsters 1986

Mutitjpuy (Djamika) Munungurr

Djangkawu Sisters 1985

Yananymul (Thelma) Munungurr

Crocodile and Sacred Fire Dreaming 1985

Mutitjpuy (Djamika) Munungurr

Fire Dreaming 1985

Gift of the Yirrkala People of North East

Arnhem Land, 1985

ART ON CAMPUS

BC building, Melbourne Burwood Campus

Geelong Waterfront Campus

Portraits at the Chancellery and Corporate Centre

Image upper left:

Portraits of former Chancellors from left

Clifton Pugh AO

Portrait of Dr. Peter Thwaites OBE 1983

Madge Ellis

Portrait of Justice Austin Asche AC QC 1987

Rick Amor

Portrait of Dr Richard Searby AO QC 2003

Image lower left:

Portraits of former Chancellors from left

Peter Wegner

Portrait of Mr David Morgan AO 2015

Brian Dunlop

Portrait of Dr James Leslie AC MC 1991

Image above:

Portraits of former Vice-Chancellors from left to right: Judy Cassab CBE AO

Portrait of Emeritus Professor Frederic Jevons AO

1986

Wesley Walters

Portrait of Emeritus Professor Malcolm Skilbeck 1991

Robert Hannaford AM

Portrait of Emeritus Professor John Hay AC 1995

Lewis Miller

Portrait Professor Geoffrey Wilson AM 2002

Jan Williamson

Portrait of Emeritus Professor Sally Walker AM 2010

THINKING BRAVE

These past few weeks have seemed like an extraordinarily busy period in the working life of our art gallery team. Packing up the previous exhibition and the setting up of a major new exhibition, incorporating dance, light works and opera singing; conducting an online webinar with alumni; hanging new acquisitions in the main library; facilitating interns and their research project on collection items; processing artwork donations; chasing up copyright permissions; photographing works; drafting media releases; posting on social media and changing over artworks in the Chancellery at the Geelong Waterfront Campus, is but a small sample array of the tasks that unfold in any given week. Preoccupied with such demands, it is sometimes difficult to understand the purpose and reasoning of what we are doing.

In the midst of everything, have had a couple of moments of reflection. Art Collection Officer Claire Muir and I observed a second-year visual art student posting his working collages inspired by Jenny Watson’s amazing Yellow Painting 1975. He was hanging them temporarily for assessment on the glass façade in close proximity to the prominent painting in building P. On a different occasion whilst hanging another artwork, a photography student stopped me in my tracks to inquire about the art and how we handle and display works on campus.

Having joined Deakin a little more than a year ago I am still getting to understand the histories, details, and texture of the Collection and the University community. Deakin was formally established in 1974 as one of the first Universities in the country to specialise in distance education and the first to be established in regional Victoria. 1976 saw the establishment of Deakin at Waurn Ponds, Geelong, by the merger of Gordon Institute of Technology’s higher education courses and Waurn Ponds site with the State College of Victoria at Geelong (previously “Geelong Teachers College”). 1977 saw the first students enrolled on campus. With high hopes and enthusiasm Peter Anderson, artist and then Head of Art and Design Centre became the inaugural curator of the Collection from 1977 –1979 working from the former textile mills in Pakington Street, Newtown.1

The 1980s saw further amalgamations across the Victorian higher education sector with the State College of Victoria (Toorak), the Burwood State College and Rusden State College joining with the Prahran College of Advanced Education and become Victoria College.

The Victoria College Collection had a long and fascinating development spanning over fifty years of acquiring by its antecedent institutions. One such institution, Burwood College, took over the new premises in 1954 and with many new buildings and bare walls the then lecturer in charge of art, Max Dimmack, circulated a letter requesting donations from his artist friends and colleagues. This call out resulted in significant works being donated by William Frater and sculptor Clifford Last. 2 Not long after a levy of one pound on student fees was instituted, to acquire further works on an ongoing basis. As well, works were purchased through the building program. In the 1970s funds provided through the Visual Arts and Craft Board of the Australia Council, provided for new acquisitions and for artist-in-residence

programs, where the artists were also encouraged to donate works to the Collection.

With various disparate collections coming together, Rodney James was employed in 1985 to catalogue the Victoria College collection in its entirety for the first time and advised on the hiring of a full-time curator. 3 Mary Newsome was appointed curator in 1986. Deakin then completed further mergers with the Warrnambool Institute of Advanced Education in 1990 and then with Victoria College in 1991. These antecedent institutions and their respective collections were formally combined to form the Deakin University Art Collection under development of then curator and manager, Caroline Field.

Interestingly, the Collection came full circle in 2014 when the 1954 foundation year students from Burwood Teachers College, donated a painting to the University Art Collection by Max Dimmack called Dark Conifers 2013 in celebration of the 60th anniversary of the foundation of the Burwood Teachers College in nearby Box Hill. Sixty years later former lecturers Max Dimmack and Dr Lawrie Shears still attend the annual reunions. The painting was formally accepted by Alfred Deakin Professor Christine Ure, Head of School, School of Education, Deakin University.

After several decades of evolution, the Collection now comprises of over two thousand artworks by over eight hundred artists. Numerous colleagues have contributed enormous care, scholarship and research to the Collection in this time. Curatorial and collections staff alumni include Ben Curnow, Sandra Bruce, Jane Devery, Victor Griss, Roxanna Richens, Emma Busowsky Cox and Claire Muir amongst others.

For the last ten years, the Collection has been developed and overseen by Leanne Willis, Manager Art Collection and Galleries. Willis’s careful stewardship and collection management have advanced the presence of visual arts significantly in the Deakin community, with the addition of the main library gallery space and Deakin Downtown Pop-Up Gallery. Willis’s leadership saw the acquisitions budget re-established and development of donation programs, resulting in holdings of the Collection growing significantly in her tenure.

Maintaining and developing the Collection demonstrates the University’s interest in the study, patronage and advancement of the visual arts in Australia. With the aim of expanding and enriching the Collection, potential acquisitions of contemporary importance are examined and appraised for their cultural merit, in accordance with acquisition criteria designed to preserve and enhance the character of this unique repository of works. The vast majority of Deakin’s Art Collection is on public display throughout Deakin’s four physical campuses with over a thousand works out on display at any one time.

To develop, maintain and make accessible a visual art collection of national significance and repute, reflects the cultural aspirations of Deakin University and its strategic goals of Learning, Ideas, Value and Experience.

The Deakin University Art Collection can be categorised into two principal collecting areas: Premium Collection and Special Collections. The Premium Collection comprises the University’s most prestigious artworks, which have been acquired over a period of forty years through a combination of careful purchasing, generous gifts and bequests. This collection focuses on the work of outstanding contemporary Australian artists who have a record of practice, excellence and achievement of their art form.

Many public institutions also develop areas of speciality within their Art Collections. The Deakin University Art Collection has four areas of speciality: The Sculpture Collection, The Artists’ Book Collection, The Campus Collection and The Centre for Abstract and Non-Objective Art.

The Artists’ Book Collection represents some of the most captivating and intriguing examples of Australian and international unique artists’ books and limited editions. There are few public art collections specialising in this art form. As a medium, it offers artists and audiences an opportunity for immediate and intimate experiences.

The Campus Collection consists of works across a wide range of media that includes painting, printmaking, drawing, ceramics and photography. This collection contains examples of artworks by the former student and staff alumni and celebrates the achievements and artistic endeavours of the University community. Some of these works have been acquired over a period of fifty years through purchase, awards, gifts and contributions from other educational institutions, including the Douglas McDonell State College of Victoria Art Collection.

The Sculpture Collection is a significant body of large-scale public artworks from a range of contemporary Australian artists that contribute to improving both the building, landscape and cultural environments of the four physical campuses of Deakin University. The addition of the Contemporary Small Sculpture Award to the annual exhibition program over the last nine years has also complemented the holdings of the Sculpture Collection. More spatial and context driven practices, small sculptures, maquettes and unrealised propositions for larger works have fostered breadth and depth to the Collection.

With the recent development of the University’s Indigenous Action Plan, the importance of supporting Indigenous voices and giving prominence to Indigenous Culture has resulted in significant recent acquisitions. In 2016 for example, twentytwo new artworks by thirteen Indigenous artists (including one unique artist group) were acquired for new environs of Deakin Downtown. All these artists were new to the Collection and represent some of the diversity of Indigenous voices, cultures and artistic practices in Australia. Many of these wonderful acquisitions are featured in this book, I hope you enjoy and appreciate them.

The Centre for Abstract and Non-Objective Art is a newly formed section of the Collection. This is an initiative led by Leanne Willis and artist Stephen Wickham to attract and consolidate holdings of both abstract and non-objective artistic practices.

From my time lecturing at other educational institutions, I started to think of teaching as more than just the delivery of information and content to students. The most important aspect I valued as a teacher was setting up an environment in which learning takes place. Establishing a protected setting where critical thinking and questioning was encouraged, where tough statements can be spoken, difficult truths aired. Once this space was created, learning seemed to happen at a quickened pace. When think of university life today, it’s difficult not to compare it to my own studies in the early 1990s. can remember only a few classes and lectures that attended, but I have stronger memories of student protests, projects and exhibitions. What did endure were relationships, friendships and artistic colleagues that have lasted decades. Fast track to university life in 2017, in many ways things cannot be more different with the sheer size of the student cohort, content delivered online and a user/client driven system.

The Collection plays a vital role in our current pedagogic and economic context. Connecting students with the visual stories of artists, their divergent voices, and experiences, opens up a dialogue with the past and present helping to create the learning landscape. But the Collection also tells a story about the institution, its histories and focuses over time and is living proof of the important cultural role universities play in leading society: advancing knowledge, ethics and the responsible exchange of ideas.

With art now embedded into the fabric and architecture of the University, we are exposed to the differing subjectivities of artists, their materialities and creative thinking on a daily basis. In an era where employment for graduates can never be guaranteed, how are we equipping students to adapt and change? And how are we equipping students to contribute meaningfully in their non-working lives to be more than just consumers? For the Collection, here lies its greatest purpose.

Specialisation is becoming of less significance than our abilities to change thinking and to inter-connect disciplines in new ways. Thinking around art and understanding the creative risks of the past can give us the agency and resourcefulness to evolve and change with the new situations and contexts as they emerge. The Collection can be seen then, not so much about the accumulation of objects of value but, as artist and educator Luis Camnitzer explains, “we can view it as a flexible mechanism within which our realities can be reorganised”. Art is a meta-discipline that teaches new ways of thinking and hence, through art we can meet the new world with both courage and imagination.

James Lynch Curator, Art Collection and Galleries Deakin University

1. V. Anderson, phone conversation with the author, September 13, 2017.

2. M. Newsome, Portraying Australian Culture, Victoria College Magazine, Number 5, August, 1989, pp.16-17.

3. R. James, in conversation with the author, July 11, 2017.

4. L uis Camnitzer An Artist, a Leader, and a Dean Were on a Boat… e-flux Journal #55 May 2014 http://www.e-flux.com/journal/55/60319/an-artist-a-leader-and-a-deanwere-on-a-boat/ [Accessed 7 September 2017]

Werribee Learning Centre

Alexander McKenzie A Private Garden 2012

Melbourne Burwood Campus Main Library

Jayne Dyer A Reading: 3 2008

Warrnambool Campus

Library reading area

David Frazer

Rest Stop 2010

Warrnambool Campus

Brother Fox Cafe

Bruce Latimer

U.N. Exaggerated View 1978

Air Condition 1980

Guarded Thoughts/ Different Dogs 1978

IN OUT: IRAN 1980

Black Out Print 1977

Donated through the Commonwealth Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by the artist, 2013

Deakin Downtown Level 13

from left: Lisa Uhl Kurrkapi 2016 Boneta-Marie Mabo

Your label #2 2015

E. Bonita Mabo AO, Munbarra, South Sea Islander descendant (Tanna Island) 2015

Geelong Waterfront Campus Library reading area

John Nixon Self-Portrait (Non Objective Composition) 1985

Melbourne Burwood Campus

Deakin University English Language Institute

Song Ling and the Victoria Tapestry Workshop

Kong Fu- Our Dream 2009

SCULPTURE COLLECTION

Robyne Latham Empty Coolamon Snake (detail) 2015

Margel Hinder Interlock 1979

Gift of an anonymous donor, 1981

Though it is fundamentally a simple arrangement of three interlocking circular shapes, Interlock has a very strong presence and commands the open space where it is placed; the visual possibilities of the asymmetrical arrangement seem endlessly fascinating. Originally fabricated by Keith Jackson in Sydney in 1979 from Hinder’s small maquette of 1973, the sculpture was very skilfully restored in 2015 by Ben Fasham, Melbourne, with stainless steel replacing the rusted steel bolts. When she arrived in Australia at the age of 28, Margel Hinder already had first-hand knowledge of modernist sculptors such as Brancusi, Gabo and Pevsner from her studies in New York. Yet interestingly, her fascination with local timbers led her to produce abstracted forms of birds, animals and numerous depictions of the human figure. Then by the late 40s, she was designing elegant and totally abstract forms, using a range of materials new to sculpture in Australia, such as Monel metal, delicate fuse wire, copper wire and Perspex. It

seems entirely appropriate that her sculpture should now be situated in front of the building housing the Institute for Frontier Materials at Deakin University. In contrast with these works produced in her studio, Hinder also received a number of major commissions for large-scale, outdoor sculptures in Sydney, Canberra, Newcastle and Adelaide, but regrettably, none in Melbourne. Deakin University is extremely fortunate to have acquired this excellent example by an artist who was one of the first modernist sculptors in Australia.

Ken Scarlett OAM

Deakin

University

Sculpture Walk Brochure 2016.

More information on the University Sculpture Walk can be found on line through the Deakin University Art Gallery website at deakin.edu.au/art-collection

Geelong Waurn Ponds Campus

Inge King

Shinjuku 1975

Gift of the artist, 1992

Geelong Waurn Ponds Campus

Melbourne Burwood Campus

Opposite:

Melbourne Burwood Campus

Geoffrey Bartlett Silver Cloud 1995

Bruce Armstrong Lotus Eater 1993

Melbourne Burwood Campus

Deakin Business School entrance

Tim Jones 2002

Melbourne Burwood Campus

Adrian Mauriks

Compilation 2003

Gift of the artist, 2007

Opposite: Melbourne Burwood Campus

Augustine Dall’Ava

Distilled Knowledge 2000

Australian Bureau of Statistics, Geelong

Peter Taylor

Morning at Stanwell Park 1979

Opposite: Geelong Waurn Ponds Campus

Peter Blizzard Optima 1998

Constructed from stainless steel and bluestone the fluidity of this work belies its true nature. A standing wave is defined by the Collins English Dictionary as the periodic disturbance in a medium resulting from the combination of two waves of equal frequency travelling in opposite directions. Knowing that, wonder when viewing this work if the artist intended that reference due to the forcing of strong materials into an unnatural yet fluid shape or as reference to her own background as an interdisciplinary Tasmanian Aboriginal artist, who now investigates the connections between art, science and society through her Global Mind Project. Whatever the true message is behind the work it is a fluid beautiful sculpture which captures our imagination and attention.

This work resonates powerfully for me as multiple sediments of an exquisite rustle of pain, anguish, resilience and optimism. The tryptich-installation is the narrative of the symbolic displacement of colonisation through the act of emptying/emptiness; and yet also strongly tells/shows the continuity and resilience of Aboriginal family, connection, nourishment and Belonging. For me, the Coolamon is the craft of simultaneous reality – it is full of nothing and yet filled with everything. A timeless, critical vessel of Knowledges, Being and the originary Beginning itself.

The ‘final’ emptiness a beautiful pathos: smile with the tears of my Ancestors. We are here, they whisper. We hold you always.

Associate Professor Gabrielle Fletcher Language Group: Gundungurra Institute of Koorie Education

Robyne Latham

Empty Coolamon Spring-Time 2015

Empty Coolamon Snake 2015 Empty 2015

Karen Casey Standing Wave 2002

Leanne Willis

Nike Savvas

Halo 2016

Sydney-based contemporary artist Nike Savvas (b. 1964) trained formally as a painter but is renowned for her immersive, largescale public installations in which simple, colourful geometric shapes are repeated to spectacular effect.

Halo was a commission for the Deakin University Art Collection as part of the Waurn Ponds Estate refurbishment in 2016. The work features 36 coloured discs of metallised acrylic, suspended vertically in a grid-like screen structure. The mirrored discs refract light as they move in a gentle motion stimulated by the natural air movement of the room, both taking in and reflecting back the surrounding environment in a state of random and continual renewal. The title of the work evokes an image of a radiant circle of light with divine and spiritualist associations.

A belief in the spiritual significance of geometric form underpins the notion of Sacred Geometry, which connects its mathematical principles with the force of creation, particularly as seen in nature. Geometric ratios also inform the architectural design of scared spaces as well as certain ritualistic practices and symbology. The mandala, for example, is often composed of a square and a circle, and represents the cosmos in the Hindu and Buddhist faiths.

Halo may be regarded as part of a lineage within both geometric abstraction and public art. Russian avant-garde artist Kazimir Malevich was a major proponent of geometric abstract art in the early 20th century. He created abstract paintings composed of elemental shapes, such as the circle and the square, arranged on

a white ground. In his 1924 Manifesto of Suprematism Malevich stated that pure feeling in creative art was its supreme element.1 This desire to stir an emotional response in the viewer is also one of Savvas’ motivations for her work. ‘Colour has a primal effect on people…My installations are immersive and create an interaction with the viewer’s personal and physical space.’2

In the trajectory of abstract art, Suprematism’s close relative is Constructivism, whose exponents strived to create an accessible ‘art for the people.’ Public art is similarly socially motivated, and by definition, placed within the public sphere, outside the traditional gallery space in order to engage the incidental viewer. In this way, the art of Nike Savvas is idealist. Like the internationalism of abstract art, or perhaps rather, its non-nationalism, it is accessible to all, transcending borders, cultural and otherwise.

Emma Busowsky Cox

Former Curator, Deakin University Art Collection and Galleries Bachelor of Arts (Honours), Deakin and Graduate Certificate of Museum Studies, Deakin

1. K azimir S. Malevich, Suprematist Manifesto, 1924, reproduced at https://www. scribd.com/document/143287897/SUPREMATISM-MANIFESTO-UNOVIS-pdf, accessed 6 September 2017

2. J ane O’Sullivan, Artist Interview: Nike Savvas, Art Collector magazine, 18 May 2010, http://www.artcollector.net.au/ArtistInterviewNikeSavvas accessed 6 September 2017

SMALL SCULPTURE & ARTIST BOOKS COLLECTION

Yvonne Kendall

Penny Byrne is both an authority on ceramic restoration and an artist who deconstructs the same medium. Bold, confrontational and thought provoking, Byrne’s artwork manipulates mass produced, kitschy ceramic figurines to comment on the relationship between popular culture and politics. She highlights worldwide issues of concern, including political imprisonment, whaling and global warming, as well as challenging the actions of specific individuals, such as Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, John Howard and David Hicks.

In his essay for Byrne’s exhibition Commentariat at the Deakin University Art Gallery in 2011, curator and art historian John McPhee noted how Byrne constantly updates her work to reference the changes in the current political climate. Former US President George W. Bush’s “war on terror” has been one of many key themes that Byrne has focused on and the War on Terror Waltz (2009) is a more recent version.

An anonymous couple, clad in their finest camouflage and military helmets, dance uncomfortably together with a gun in hand and grenades at the waist. The gentleman wears a miniature War On Terror Service Medal proudly on his chest as a striking reminder that this “war” has not yet reached its conclusion. Together, the pair appear to move in circles around each other forever, proving that as Byrne herself once commented, “The War on Terror Waltz continues on and on and on…”

The whimsical nature of the original porcelain figurines, with their serene and sweetly vacant expressions, contrast sharply with their new attire and purpose as re-imagined by Byrne. At once confronting and humorous, War on Terror Waltz represents a fine example of Byrne’s skill in using collage to emphasise the dramatic power of small sculpture as a medium.

Claire Muir Art Collection Officer, Art Collection and Galleries

Penny Byrne

War on Terror Waltz 2009

Mikala Dwyer Empty Sculpture 2014

Stephen Benwell Statue, Grey-Pink Man 2009

This exquisite sculpture by Stephen Benwell was the inaugural winner of the Deakin University Contemporary Small Sculpture Award in 2009. Initially established with assistance from academic Ruth Rentschler, the then Chair of Arts and Entertainment Management, the Award was begun to support contemporary artists, promote closer links with industry and promote awareness of the University’s contemporary Sculpture Collection. Since it began, the Award has run annually and has now grown to attract entries from

every state and territory in Australia and in 2017, six different countries. In the period since it began 1,688 different artists have entered the Award, many of them multiple times. As we move towards the tenth anniversary exhibition in 2018 we take a moment to acknowledge the winners and the highly commended entries and thank the many artists and industry professionals who have contributed towards its success.

Leanne Willis

Vipoo Srivilasa

Thep Cingco (Kangaroo Deity) 2017

Dadang Christanto Wuku #1, Dukhut 2012

Pamel Irving An Angel for Fake Truth 2016

I’m Your Man II (cup & saucer) 1997

I’m Your Man III (cup & saucer) 1997

The Artist’s Book Collection at Deakin University provides an insight into the community of book artists in Victoria. The cross currents of collaboration between artists, writers, binders and printmakers means that there are often overlaps between works, as artists appear in varying roles in different publications. One may be contributing an image here and a text there, or their contribution may be more elusive but just as important. Ranging from bookbinder Nick Doslov from Renaissance Bookbinding to Jenny Zimmer in a multitude of roles, these artists have contributed towards the development of the medium of artists’ books through their work and example.

Book artists work with each other in different ways, imparting skills, knowledge, materials and inspiration to each other over time. The ongoing nature of collections of this kind means that whenever an artist’s work is included in this collection, it will also have a lasting impact upon future students and artists. As this collection grows each work held in it will have an influence not just upon immediate viewers, but also upon the history and development of artists’ books in this country.

Robert Heather Excerpt from Books Crossing catalogue, Deakin University Art Gallery, 2009

Peter Lyssiotis A Gardener at Midnight: Travels in the Holy Land 2004

Gerry Wedd

Alex Selenitsch

PATILIRRIKIRLI 2002

Judy Holding

My Landscape 2008

Simryn Gill Jambu Sea, Jambu Air 2013

Kenny Pittock

Ninety Nine Drawings Of People On The Train 2015

CAMPUS COLLECTION

The Campus Collection consists of works across a wide range of media that includes painting, printmaking, drawing, ceramics and photography. This collection contains examples of artworks by former student and staff alumni and celebrates the achievements and artistic endeavours of the University community.

Katherine Hattam

The doctor’s dilemma 2007

Waurn Ponds Estate

Brian Martin Methexical Countryscape Bundjalung #1 2015 Methexical Countryscape Paakantyi #11 2015

Sonja Boehm Transformation 2015

Former Deakin Creative Arts student Sonja Boehm was selected from a group of student peers to complete an artist book for the Collection in 2015. Overseen by Deakin Academic Dr Gail Weiss the development of the work exemplified the ideals of the Artist Book program.

first saw Boneta-Marie Mabo’s work at Deakin’s Institute of Koorie Education in 2014. Whilst there visiting one day, Professor Brian Martin took me to view her work in a studio as she was then one of their students. The sophistication of the work and the strong sense of design was impressive for someone so young. It could have been that the subject matter of these works, to honour her grandfather Eddie ‘Koiki’ Mabo, combined with the close personal impact of such an important figure in Australian history inspired such a powerful piece, but I had no hesitation in recommending its acquisition for the University’s art collection. So I was excited to once again reconnect with her work when these two pieces were displayed at IKE in a solo exhibition in 2016.

Coming from her first solo exhibition at the State Library of Queensland in June 2016 they resulted from her being the inaugural artist-in-residence for the State Library of Queensland’s kuril dhagun Indigenous centre in 2015. Whilst undertaking the residency she found portraits of Indigenous women without any name, or with labels such as “black velvet” or “gin”, as Mabo said

they were considered to be objects rather than women. Rarely were these ancestors afforded any respect so she created the soft sculptures to “encourage viewers to acknowledge all women that are passed who didn’t have the ability to have control of their image or of their identity”.

Also as part of that exhibition she created a contrasting series of portraits presenting four women of today as full and unique human beings, celebrating women at different stages of their lives who chose their own poses and were labelled exactly as they wanted to be seen. This stunning portrait of her grandmother was completed after many conversations with her grandmother to choose the right time to paint her…“young, hard at work and powerful”. We are privileged to be the caretakers of these powerful and important works which have quickly become significant pieces in the University’ art collection.

Dreaming stories from the Creation times hold significance to Aboriginal peoples as they are reminders of our past, create meaning of our present and direct our future. Whilst many traditional Creational stories contain elements of lore and aspects of cultural sacredness, contemporary transformations are other expressions of meaning. In describing Emu Dreaming – Feathers, one immediately notices the bold richness of colour that emphasises energy, motion, and inner form. Each vibrant stroke provokes emotion through an interplay of colour, light and texture. It speaks about Country (land).

Professor Liz Cameron Director, Institute of Koorie Education

Raymond Walters Japanangka Emu Dreaming – Feathers 2016

Leanne Willis

Boneta-Marie Mabo

E. Bonita Mabo AO Munbarra, South Sea Islander Descendant (Tanna Island) 2015

Your Label #2 2015

Ewen Coates

Fountain of Youth 2010

There is something very nostalgic in Ewen Coates’ Fountain of Youth sculpture. It evokes memories of my youth, the styles, the fashion, even the somewhat cocky angle of stance of the hips and bent knee portrayed in the sculpture, depicting how my peers and I all embraced life as younger people. The sculpture itself represents not only reminiscence, but perhaps more excitingly, it is an experimental take on an earlier work, Disgrace. In the true spirit of youth, their capacity and desire for risk taking and their ability to face the world in their tight jeans, with a slight slouch of posture, this work is very appropriately named.

While Coates is an Alumnus I am quite confident, this work completed many years after he graduated, is more appropriately, aligned with his thought processes and experiences post-Deakin as well. Nevertheless, it is a connector at the University. Situated in a prominent public space, have been privileged to meet many visitors to Deakin and to be able to make a connection with them through our shared engagement with and in discussion of this particular sculpture. It is almost as though the Fountain of Youth is one of our group, contributing to and exuding a personality of its own.

Professor Brenda Cherednichenko Executive Dean, Faculty of Arts and Education

Alison Bennett

Untitled (birds and butterflies) 2013

Allison Bennett is undertaking Creative Practice by Research PhD 2017, Deakin University Motion Lab.

Untitled (birds and butterflies) 2013 was acquired for the Collection from Bennett’s exhibition Shifting Skin held at the Deakin University Art Gallery 2013, curated by Leanne Willis. The exhibition went on to tour, the Kingston Arts Centre, Cork Film Centre, Ireland, the Wyndham Cultural Centre, Swan Hill Regional Art Gallery, 10x 8 Gallery, Sydney and Theorizign the Web Gallery, New York. The exhibition of giclee prints with augmented reality overlay attracted worldwide attention in various media outlets including ABC TV news, and outlets in USA, Mexico, Italy, Indonesia, France, Spain, India and South Africa just to name a few.

Leanne Willis

Minna Gilligan Sweetheart, stay well (detail) 2014

recall as a new migrant to Australia being awestruck by the vast mysterious land that was Australia. Then I discovered John Olsen. am transfixed by the way Olsen’s work takes us on a journey through the varied landscapes of Australia, highlighting the changeability of seasons, the stark colours and, always, the energy of the people. And, then there is his approach to the unique Australian fauna and flora. He challenges us to think differently about what we see.

Big sky, the vast spaces and inserted deftly, the Emu. This work, Emus captures the Olsen genius of minimalism and sparse colour to show the vitality of this wonderful animal. With its wavy lines

and colourful splashes and dots it is instantly recognisable as an Olsen –a joyous depiction of sheer delight in the wonderful Australian landscape.

Olsen is one of Australia’s greatest living artists and I am sure our namesake Alfred Deakin would be delighted by the synergy between his own love of country, as expressed through his writing, and Olsen’s unique perspective of the Australian landscape. It’s a grand connection of our University history connecting to the current day.

Professor Jane den Hollander AO Vice-Chancellor, Deakin University

John Olsen

The Circus Animals’ Desertion 1994

John Olsen Emus 1977

“One of the rarest qualities in contemporary painting is wit. When we do encounter it, we are surprised, almost ambushed by its presence, and then find ourselves immediately engaged. Jan Senbergs’ Geelong Capriccio is in every way a painting of wit with its single absurd proposition as to what the world would look like if Geelong had become the capital and the site of Melbourne remained open paddocks...

T.S. Eliot once shrewdly remarked that wit was the ‘alliance of levity and seriousness’. What makes Senbergs’ Geelong Capriccio a work of real substance along with a certain sweeping grandeur to it, is that it points to one of the most serious and enduring qualities of the Australian experience. Australians and the cities they inhabit are caught between two extreme conditions; a vast and thinly populated inland and an equally vast, uninhabited space, the oceans of the world. There is

something precarious about this clinging to the littoral – a condition shared by no other country in the world. By moving the centre from Hobson’s Bay to Corio Bay, Senbergs takes us one large step closer to ‘the deserts of ocean’. It seems to me to be a very Antipodean painting: the upside down world, which Europe imagined Australia to be, a place where anything might happen.

Eliot went on to say that by the ‘alliance of levity and seriousness … the seriousness is intensified’ and so it is in Jan Senbergs’ masterpiece, Geelong Capriccio.”

Patrick McCaughey, 2010

Reproduced with author’s permission from the catalogue Geelong Re-imagined and Observed Works from the West Coast by Jan Senbergs, Deakin University Art Gallery, 2011

The Four Seasons of Life 1987

Leonard French’s The Four Seasons of Life 1987 was commissioned to mark the tenth anniversary of Deakin University. Although now 30 years old the work glows as if produced only yesterday. Perhaps best known as the artist who produced the ceiling in the Great Hall at the National Gallery of Victoria, French’s stained glass work adorns many Australian public institutions such as the Australian National University and the National Library of Australia in Canberra. In the Queen’s Birthday Honours in 1968, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for his service to painting, being considered an accomplished painter, printmaker and

stained glass artist. Although his profile faded in the later years of his life and career it is fitting that we now pay homage to the extraordinary nature of his work that still retains its impact some 30 years on.

According to the records kept with this work, The Four Seasons of Life synthesizes the universal insignia of the cross, circle, dome, serpent, and bird to create a rich yet spiritual visual impact. These designs are created on a layered enamelled surface, which give the piece a shimmering luminosity.

Leanne Willis

Leonard French

Jan Senbergs

Geelong Capriccio (If Geelong were settled instead of Melbourne) 2010

David Harley File_49& 2011-2014

David Harley is a contemporary, Melbourne-based artist who integrates the technology of computing and printing into his practice as a painter. Harley’s paintings draw from an understanding of European, Australian and American abstraction, while also being strongly influenced by the artist’s philosophical and musical interests. As a great grandson of Alfred Deakin, Harley has a close connection with the University.

“The files names often represent the initials that the computer file gathers in its development. Sometimes it is hard to work out where it started, although the file, File_49&, name refers to the 49th Symphony of Haydn in F minor. The listening of music is often used as a trigger or stimulus. There is a fusion reached between the mood experienced by listening to particular music and then being able to convey that within the pictorial work.”

Artist’s statement 2014

Roger Kemp Transition 1970

Arthur Boyd Bayswater Winter 1959

Robert Klippel Bronze No.1 1981

Gift of an anonymous donor, 1981

George Baldessin

Wall Mural 1975

One of the most intriguing aspects of Wall Mural 1975, is what it reveals to us about the artist, George Baldessin’s (19391978), dual practice as a sculptor and printmaker. Not only did Baldessin move freely between the two disciplines, exploiting the unique properties of each; he often combined elements of both in a single work.

This was certainly the case with Wall Mural. The mural is reminiscent of a worked etching plate. The female form, one of Baldessin’s favoured recurring motifs, is depicted in low relief, accentuating his sensitive use of line. As fellow printmaker and sculptor Jock Clutterbuck observed, Baldessin was ‘very

comfortable with the practicalities of drawing on a soft clay slab, like it was an etching plate’. The mural, freed from the constraints of traditional sculpture, offered Baldessin a way to capture the nuances of a shallow printing plate etched with line. Baldessin’s experiments with cutting and shaping plates is also echoed in this piece in the abstracted fragments that unfold like a concertina across the wall, revealing body parts and architectural elements. Our eyes are drawn up and across with the thrust of the mural, encouraged by the movement of the bodies.

The clarity and resolution of this piece can, in many ways, be attributed to a pair of ambitious works Baldessin was working on

earlier in the same year. Baldessin had been selected, along with Imants Tillers, to represent Australia at the São Paulo Biennial in 1975. It was here he exhibited two large-scale works alongside each other; the fourteen-metre, multi-panel etching Occasional images from a city chamber 1975; and the cast aluminum sculpture Occasional screens with seating arrangement 1975. The pair demonstrate a rigorous testing and exploration of scale, composition, and the interaction of two and three dimensional space. In both the prints and the seven-metre free-standing sculpture, the female figure is the central focus which, along with architectural elements such as doorways and furniture, dictate the movement and tempo of the works.

Wall Mural is a refined synthesis of Baldessin’s printmaking and sculptural practice, revealing his command and fascination with both disciplines, as well as his proficiency as a draftsman.

Nicole Bowller

Curator and Ursula Hoff Art History Scholarship recipient 2015, University of Melbourne

Sisters Tjungkara Ken, Yaritji Young, Maringka Tunkin, Freda Brady and Sandra Ken are part of the large but tight knit Ken family. Distinguished artists and daughters of senior artist Mick Wikilyiri, they are custodians of the honey ant story cycle. Together the Ken family are a dynasty of artists, painters and story tellers of the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara lands located at Amata in the far northwest corner of South Australia.

The Seven Sisters is a Tjukurpa or creation story about the constellations of Pleiades and Orion. The story describes Orion as Nyiru traditionally known as a lusty or bad man. Nyiru is forever chasing Pleiades or the seven sisters of the painting’s title, as it is said he wants to marry the eldest sister. The seven sisters travel again and again from the sky to the earth to escape Nyiru’s unwanted attentions. They turn into their human form to escape but he always finds them and they flee back to the sky. As Nyiru is chasing the sisters he tries to catch them by using magic to turn himself into the most

tempting kampurarpra (bush tomatoes) for the sisters to eat and the most beautiful Ili (fig) tree for them to camp under. However, the sisters are too clever for Nyiru and outwit him as they are knowledgeable about his magic. They go hungry and run through the night rather than be caught, but every now and again one of the women falls victim to his ways. It is said that he eventually captures the youngest sister, but with the help of the oldest, she escapes back to her sisters who are waiting for her. Eventually they fly back into the sky to escape, reforming the constellation.

In 2016 The Ken Sisters were commissioned by Deakin University to produce this unique and profound painting. The work describes a story that is ancient, yet it is also contemporary, as it is a story of powerful women who work together to overcome adversity to sustain culture and community.

James Lynch

The Ken Sisters working in the studio at Tjala Arts, Amata community, APY Lands, South Australia 2016. Images courtesy of Unrupa Rhonda Dick and Tjala Arts.

The Ken Sisters

Freda Brady

Sandra Ken

Tjungkara Ken

Maringka Tunkin

Yaritji Young

Seven Sisters 2016

John Wolseley

South flank of the dune 1993

“I have been trying to understand sand dunes their layering, their rhythms and movements and their cyclic developments which have the structure and elegance of a complex mathematical theory. Often I have been camped in the swale of some huge longitudinal dune and during the night, the wind from some unusual quarter has quarried down through several strata of sand and revealed hidden layers of great antiquity say a thousand year old camp of the Wanganuru people. Or revealed the geography of an older dune system which in turn may cover the fossilized remains of a Pleistocene forest. I have been looking upon these

layered ‘archaeologies’, these gold and red piles of different histories and systems as a metaphor for the human psyche; the way each of us could be seen as walking a many-layered world of passions, ancestral memories, neuroses, genetic patterns and ancient archetypes.”

Dale Cox

Usurper – High tension 2015

As someone who didn’t grow up in this country there are certain images that make an impression on me as being classic Australian. When first saw this work it immediately drew me in and captured my imagination. It is one of my favourite pieces in our Collection. I find that it conjures up a natural tie to our Waterfront campus. The stunning building that now stands as the centrepiece of the campus was once a cornerstone of primary business for Geelong as the wool store. First built in 1934, the building was renovated by the University in 2009.

On first viewing this piece from a distance, the shimmering gold background appears to elevate the status of the sheep. On

further inspection you notice the power lines on the back of the sheep. The artist explains that the work is called Usurper which is someone (or something) that wrongfully takes someone else’s place. The power lines scar across the sheep as a reminder that sheep themselves are foreign to the natural bush land as we are to this beautiful landscape.

More than ever, we must be mindful of the effect we have on the natural environment.

Ron Fairchild Vice-President and Chief Advancement Officer

John Wolseley, Artist statement, Paintings, lithographs and sedimentary prints from the Simpson Desert, Rex Irwin Art Dealer, Sydney, NSW, 1993.

Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda

Sally Gabori

Dibirdibi Country 2011

Deakin is privileged to be able to share Dibirdibi Country by Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda Sally Gabori with its community. This work is at once confusing, disturbing and exhilarating. It is representative of so many aspects of life for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. At Deakin we share this work in the hope that others will engage with the artist’s experience too. For me, Gabori has been able to reveal the many stages of Aboriginal experience in Australia as her work takes us from brightness and colour, to the reflective depths of introspection and to the strength and explicit honesty of People and Country.

This large work can probably be responded to in many ways, but I choose to be convinced that the artist wanted to describe the contradictions of Aboriginality and their connection and need for Country, land and sea, as equally the beauty and severity, sadness and happiness, oppression and expression. Despite these challenges and complexities, I find this work uplifting and hopeful. For me, it inspires my greater commitment to know, respect and understand the connection to Country of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples and to learn from them.

Professor Brenda Cherednichenko Executive Dean, Faculty of Arts and Education

Max Meldrum

Track to Cottage, Olinda 1933

from left:

James Tylor

Aotearoa my Hawaiki #2 2015

Aotearoa my Hawaiki #3 2015

Aotearoa my Hawaiki #5 2015

Aotearoa my Hawaiki #7 2015

Aotearoa my Hawaiki #9 2015

Aotearoa my Hawaiki #10 2015

Lisa Uhl lives and works in the remote Fitzroy Crossing in the West Kimberley. Uhl represents her unique connection to place through abstracted paintings of her Country, culture and community. Uhl paints with a joyous energy: layering highly keyed colours to create an atmosphere which speaks of the humidity and expanse of the Kimberley landscape.

The basic form of the Kurrkapi tree provides the underlying structure for Uhl’s painting. She begins each canvas by repeatedly painting the form followed by contours and filling in of the negative spaces. In doing so, the work pulses with vibrant brush

marks and colours that convey the intensity of the desert heat. In Uhl’s more recent work, such as this, the negative spaces of her paintings take on a life of their own, connecting all. In doing so, Uhl gently refutes our often binary representations of nature.

Lisa Uhl is a committed and leading artist of her community, she creates work with gusto and a joie de vivre, despite living with the difficulties of a physical disability. Thus her work and life are greatly inspiring to all.

James Lynch

Lisa Uhl Kurrkapi 2016

In her most recent exhibition contemporary artist Anne Zahalka returned to representations of the Australian landscape and imagery that recalls the canon of Australian painting. The Landscape Revisited 2017 is the development of an earlier series of collages from the 1980s where Zahalka questioned national identity by altering commercial reproductions of Australian Impressionist paintings. In 2017, Zahalka has opted for a more straight forward photographic restaging of the original paintings, setting her new works in the surrounding landscapes of Beechworth in North Western Victoria.

Outlawed! 2017 is an ambiguous image. Nolan’s Ned Kelly series is reimagined as a masked, black clad, female. The figure is both

a would-be terrorist and freedom fighter and is mounted on horseback, back to front – not knowing where she is heading. This antihero is also brandishing a prop like a rifle and is wearing a large blocked logo emblazoned across her chest. Zahalka is working with an image deeply embedded to the national psyche which resonates in our consciousness. Outlawed! 2017 triggers something anew in how we see this iconic image. The artist leads us through a chain of references to further question our notions of home: ideas about access and belonging, displacement and exile.

James Lynch

Anne Zahalka Outlawed! 2017

Sidney Nolan

Untitled (Horse and Warrior) n.d.

Jim Pavlidis Champions 2008

Opposite:

Boundary Umpire is a symbolic piece that depicts a football umpire surrounded by fog on a cold winter’s day. Melbournian, Jim Pavlidis, painted this oil on canvas in 2002 and yet it is expressive of days gone by. The artist is renowned for his focus on urban life and its people, of which football has been intrinsic to his city, and mine, since the mid-1850s. am drawn to this piece as it conjures memories of my youth, growing up in Melbourne where local and VFL football were an integral part of my weekend. I have fond memories of barracking for my favourite team on a cold, frosty winter’s day where the football ground was heavily shrouded in fog and it was difficult to see the players and umpire at the other end of the field.

Today, children and adults still gather in great numbers to support their football team. When a game has been won, the victors pose for the team picture. This image becomes a fundamental record of the club’s history, and it is the second piece Champions that evokes this familiar scene. The lithograph portrays the traditional and typical image of team spirit and solidarity. The team members, their faces blurred, pose in the traditional stance: arms and legs crossed, standing in rows, ball in the middle. It could be any one of us, or any one of our relatives. Deakin is privileged to share these two wonderful pieces that are part of the University’s collection.

Kean Selway Chief Operating Officer

Boundary Umpire 2002

Aunty Marlene Gilson was born in Warrnambool and is a proud Wadawurrung traditional owner and Elder. After her father returned from service in WWII her family moved to Melbourne for work. As a young person Marlene Gilson had an aptitude for drawing and painting, attending Footscray technical school and excelling in the visual arts. Gilson held a wish to attend art school but instead entered the workforce to help support her family. She married and with her husband and young family settled in Gordon near Ballarat. Some four decades later in 2007 after a period of illness, Aunty Marlene Gilson recaptured her artistic ambition. Beginning with a series of hand painted wooden toys for her grandchildren, Gilson rediscovered her love of painting and story-telling.

Over the last 10 years Gilson has developed her artistic practice significantly using painting as an important visual link in the continuation of Wadawurrung history and culture. Cultural

knowledge and the stories that have been passed down to her are woven through her elaborately detailed figurative painted scenes. Central to her work are the histories of the goldfields, the settlement of Ballarat and the cultural links to the Kulin Nation of Melbourne. Gilson’s painting style is direct and self-taught. What initially appears to be naïve renderings are revealed to be highly detailed narratives, often telling complex histories. Marngrook 2017 is a wonderful example of her varied interests, depicting an infamous historical football match between the Ballarat Miners and the Geelong Mariners. Gilson celebrates times of great social occasion, ceremony and cultural practices that have dramatically affected her Country and People. Gilson presents these with pride and a loving memory in recalling the daily lives, rituals and the stories of the Wadawurrung.

James Lynch

After establishing the Mildura Aboriginal Cooperative, Clarke moved to Melbourne in 1988, she has become a hugely respected community and cultural leader working seamlessly across the roles of artist, curator and academic. Her research reflects on traditions, histories and the material cultures of her ancestors all of which are expressed via an especially rich engagement with both traditional and new media forms.

“It’s about regenerating cultural practices… making people aware of, you know, our culture, and that we are a really strong culture, and that we haven’t lost anything; think they’ve just been, some of these practises have been laying dormant for a while.”

Maree Clarke in conversation with ABC local radio Mildura, 12 September 2011.

After viewing nineteenth-century examples of Indigenous necklaces in the collection of Museum Victoria, Clarke rediscovered her interests in body adornment and jewellery making. Working closely with family members Len Tregonning and Rocky Tregonning they have revived a long forgotten cultural tradition. Spending a great deal of time on country collecting feathers, seeds, ochres, wattle resin and other items such as emu oil and leather. This time spent together sourcing and preparing traditional materials combines both men’s and women’s business in traditional lore. Hanging proudly at Deakin Downtown, these two magnificent works imbue the spaces with an aura of ceremony and power.

Dr David Cross Professor of Visual Arts Faculty of Arts and Education

Maree Clarke River reed necklace with Galah feathers 2016

Aunty Marlene Gilson Marngrook 2017

Sally Smart Pink Medium (Perfume) 1993

Jenny Watson The Princess and the Pauper 1990

Lisa Roet

Forearm of Chimpanzee 2000

Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Mrs Caroline Searby, 2012

Opposite: Polixeni Papapetrou Eden 2016

Mrs Caroline Searby and Dr Richard Searby have donated and contributed to the acquisition of four works by Lisa Roet for the Collection.

Dr Richard Searby AO QC was the fourth Chancellor of Deakin University from 1997 to 2005.

Nusra Latif Qureshi

Substantial Reflections II 2013

Substantial Reflections III 2013

Opposite: Gordon Bennett Abstraction (Indigene) 2011

George Gittoes

Haircut: Oedipus in China 1998

Donated by Michael Betar, 2017

Hossein Valamanesh

Where do come from? 2013

from the series: Saddened were the Hearts of Many Men 2015

Left to right:

Gig 2015, Kerry 2015, Leigh 2015, Jamie 2015, Mick 2015, Sean 2015.

Maynard is a major figure in Australian photography. His silver gelatin portraits of these Indigenous men calmly demonstrate their dignity and power as they wear the weight of history with strength and courage while clearly; proudly and defiantly standing for their communities and themselves. Indeed, these are exemplary photographs. They put the camera, and the medium to work in the best way possible. These photographs are beautiful records of humanity, of time, of place, of character, and of the complex and problematic histories of dispossession and intergenerational trauma that we all must face up to.

Like their subjects, these photographs are as potent and positive as they are melancholy. It is left to the viewer to take their paths

on board. Maynard’s work does not shout at us. It does not preach to the converted. Instead it resounds with a clarity of content and intent that, like the medium of photography, speaks easily and readily of what is before the camera and the viewer. Maynard’s photographs are always saturated with history and meaning and these important works are highlights of the Deakin collection.

Dr Patrick Pound Senior Lecturer in Art and Performance, Faculty of Arts and Education

Esther Stewart

Ornamentation is a surface gesture 2016

Emerging Melbourne and Daylesford based artist Esther Stewart, first studied sculpture but the basis of her practice springs from a love of hard-edged and geometric abstraction. The subjects of her paintings include a combination of patterns, tessellations, shapes and forms inspired by interior designs from the past and referencing the domestic spaces in which we live.

Ornamentation is a surface gesture hangs proudly at Deakin Downtown. Its warmth and vibrant colour providing a point of difference to the subtle veneers, surface palette and textures of the contemporary architectural interiors.

Recently Stewart’s practice has left the confines of a single canvas. Her bold

compositions now encapsulate a full spectrum of installation, sculpture, design and high fashion (in 2011-2014 Stewart worked as design consultant for fashion house Valentino). In a further twist, Stewart has transformed her paintings into unique handwoven woollen rugs. Taking the lofty symbol of high art she has turned it back again into an interior embellishment for the home. Beyond a discussion of high and low, Stewart’s significance lies in her ability to take the languages of fine art and translate these to other contexts. Stewart has moved far beyond the usual opportunities afforded by traditional artist’s networks in Melbourne, onto a truly international stage and hence she speaks to a global audience.

James Lynch

Ricky Maynard

Ian Milliss Judgement 1999

Ian Milliss began exhibiting in 1967 as the youngest member of Central Street Gallery Sydney. His early formal abstract works led to becoming one of Australia’s first conceptual artists in the late 1960s. After featuring in high profile exhibitions such as the John Kaldor Art Project 2 and Object or Idea at the National Gallery of Victoria, by the mid-1970s Milliss moved away from the conventional confines of the art world towards cultural activism. With artist Vivienne Binns, Milliss worked on a campaign for equal representation of Australian and women artists in the Sydney Biennale. Further work on urban issues and resident action movements led Milliss to form the first Art Workers Union in Australia and with artist Ian Burn he formed the Media Action Group and Union Media Services.

Completed while undertaking a residency and exhibition at Florida Atlantic University in 1999 Judgement is a grand painting,

representing the scales of judgement inspired by the ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead and the Negative Confession. In the Egyptian underworld, the hearts of the deceased were said to be weighed against a single feather of Maat, the goddess of truth and balance, law and order. If the heart was found to be lighter or equal in weight to the feather, the deceased was said to have led a virtuous life and would go on to next. Borrowing the visual languages of graphic design, advertising and Pop, Judgement retells an ancient mythological story to question the ideologies of contemporary life. As an alternative to the accelerated, consumer and quantitative driven life we now inhabit, Milliss suggests a move away from the burden of possessions to a lightness of being and spirit.

James Lynch

Rose Farrell and George Parkin

Owl Man 2008-2011

Owl Pair 2008-2011

Rose Farrell and George Parkin were at the forefront of Australian photography for over thirty years. Working collaboratively throughout this time their highly staged narrative tableaux considered archaic medical knowledge and historical treatments for illness. In this digital print and the accompanying papier-mâché busts, Farrell and Parkin shift focus to the intangible elements of character. These works, from the last series they created together, in many respects represent a culmination of their practice. Whereas earlier photographs involved either themselves or friends acting out scenarios in front of the camera lens, the print does not capture live action but instead a proxy of the body. Parkin’s face is photographed and printed onto cotton fabric which is subsequently sliced into fragments that are delicately pinned onto a papier-mâché bust. This creates a photographic surrogate which, together with a bust of an owl, is placed before an elaborately painted backdrop and rephotographed.

In the sixteenth century claims were made for the correspondences between human personality traits and animal characteristics. It was argued that by pairing animals with human types physiognomic resemblances between the two could provide insights into different human temperaments. This history underpins the emplacement of the busts before a landscape vista.

The backdrop is based on an illustrated edition of sixteenth century Italian poet and iconographer Cesare Ripa’s publication, Iconologia Ripa’s mythical landscapes set the scene for personifications of natural phenomenon and human behaviour. However instead of a direct copy, Farrell and Parkin cut and paste, assembling the landscape from segments of the original engravings. This is completed by conjoining a mirror reverse of the scene. Gnarled trees bend and twist to lock branches enclosing the space in a cavernous embrace. In Carl Jung’s theory of a collective unconscious the forest was an archetypal landscape imbued with latent memories from an ancestral past. In Farrell and Parkin’s depiction a sense of foreboding in the forest ribcage speaks of the primal fears and desires that characterise many wilderness narratives. It also recalls the Rorschach ink blot, a twentieth century test used to assess personality disorders. By linking ancient personality profiling with twentieth century diagnostic tools, Farrell and Parkin draw attention to the ongoing quest to find knowledge and the curious attempts to render visible human nature and the inner workings of the mind.

Wendy Garden

Curator of Australian Art Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory Graduate Museum Studies, Deakin

In Petrograd 1915, Malevich exhibits his Black Square. This radical work ensured Non-Objective Arts’ standing in history. The foundations of further counterparty abstraction are planted in Cubo-Futurism, Suprematism, Constructivism, Rayonism, De Stijl and the Bauhaus, Formalism, Minimalism; myriad schools and schisms.

The end of the Second World War saw the cultural dominance of America, and Abstract Art was promoted as an emblem of freedom and liberty. Yet it was European emigres and refugees who transformed American Art from parochial cosmopolitan.

Now, Abstract and Non-Objective Art is international and ubiquitous. Contemporary practitioners are engaged in all manner of critiques, innovations, theoretical discourses, scientific innovations and stylistic tremors. It is here to stay.

Formalesque: A Guide to Modern MacMillan Art Pub., 2007

Theo Strasser was born in Holland. He came to Australia as a child but returned to Holland in the 1970’s where he became enamoured with Mondrian and Van Gogh at the Kröller-Müller Museum in The Netherlands. Returning to Melbourne he studied at Prahran College in Melbourne under Roger Kemp and has been exhibiting since 1982. Perhaps a legacy of Kemp’s instruction, his work has been described as ‘transcendental abstraction’. This particular piece has taken months to create with the paper being dipped multiple times in a water based medium with re-staining, soaking, repainting, drying, tearing and scratching to ultimately create a fluid work of sophisticated beauty.

When describing a similar piece, Strasser stated, “I feel involved with the turmoil of the expanding world but at the same time detached. In my studio at Box Hill there is a silence that grips the suburban streets. Painting is a product of this environment, it somehow deals with landscape and rejuvenation. Connecting and questioning. Also necessity” 1

Leanne Willis

1. Artist statement from the catalogue Beyond the city: Art from the suburban studio at Deakin University Art Gallery, 2013.

Theo Strasser Pool of Thought 2010

Stephen Wickham Homage to Mr Balson No.12 2010

Donated by though the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Evan Lowenstein, 2012

Wilma Tabacco Night Flight 2008-2009

Gift of the artist, 2017

Andrew Christofides

Untitled Construction 1984 Gift of the artist, 2017

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ADVANCEMENT

There are many people to thank in the production of this publication. Firstly, we would sincerely like to thank the many people across the University who have contributed their thoughts and words to give us insights into the artworks contained within. Thank you also to the people from outside the University who contributed their words to the publication.

Thanks are also due to Preema Wong, Melinda Warnecke, Ron Fairchild and Michael Mangos from Advancement for their support of this publication. The team at the Art Collection and Galleries Unit have also been invaluable in their support including Claire Muir, Julie Nolan, Vanja Radisic, Brad Rusbridge and James Lynch. James Lynch has been both a contributor, co-designer and supporter of this publication. It would not have been possible without him. We would also like to acknowledge the dedicated work of Claire Muir who has put many hours into the development of text for this book.

We would like to also thank our designer Jasmin Tulk, Cameron Ross at FSG, Rowan Brown at Deakin Logistics and the University photographer Simon Peter Fox, who often went above and beyond in delivering fresh images for this publication.

The focus of this publication to a large degree are many of the wonderful artworks on display throughout the various campuses of Deakin University. Finally, it would be remiss not to thank the many artists for providing artworks which continue to enrich the life of the University. We would also thank the artists and commercial galleries that have assisted in giving permission to reproduce images of the works and in providing images when requested.

We hope you have enjoyed this publication.

The Art Collection and Galleries Unit is placed within the Advancement portfolio. By actively engaging Deakin staff, friends and external partners, Deakin Advancement proudly guides and delivers fundraising and alumni activities, community engagement, and corporate and commercial events.

Advancement also manages corporate and internal communications, media relations, university donations and sponsorship. In all their endeavours Advancement aims to complement Deakin’s vision to be a catalyst for positive change to benefit our students, staff and the communities we serve.

Should you be interested in learning more about Advancement please email the team on advancement@deakin.edu.au

DEAKIN UNIVERSITY ART COLLECTION

A SELECTION OF WORKS

© 2017 the artist, the authors and publisher.

Copyright to the works is retained by the artist and his/her descendants.

No part of this publication may be copied, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted or reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher and the individual copyright holder(s).

The views expressed within are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent the views held by Deakin University.

Photography is by Simon Peter Fox unless otherwise indicated.

Image measurements are height x width x depth.

Deakin University

Published by Deakin University

ISBN 978-0-9944025-8-5

Publication design: Jasmin Tulk

Deakin University Art Collection and Galleries, Deakin University Melbourne Campus at Burwood

221 Burwood Highway Burwood 3125

T +61 3 9244 5344

E artgallery@deakin.edu.au deakin.edu.au/art-collection

Facebook.com/ArtDeakin

Twitter.com/ArtDeakin

Instagram.com/deakinartgallery

izi.travel sculpture walk at Burwood

Deakin University CRICOS Provider Code 00113B

Cover image:

The Ken Sisters

Freda Brady, Sandra Ken, Tjungkara Ken, Maringka Tunkin, Yaritji Young Est. circa 2010

Seven Sisters 2016, acrylic on linen, 121 298cm, Commission, 2016

Image courtesy of the artists and Tjala Arts. Photography by Unrupa Rhonda Dick and Tjala Arts, licensed through Viscopy