Peter CLARKE

b. Australia, 1935

Untitled 1966

synthetic polymer paint and PVC on canvas

2021.67

Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Anouk Hulme in memory of Etta and Emmanuel Hirsh, 2021

About the artist and their work:

Born in Deloraine, Tasmania, painter Peter Clarke studied art at Prahran Technical College from 1951–52, followed by further studies at the Royal Melbourne Technical College from 1953–54. He began teaching at RMIT in 1963 and during the 1960s he travelled extensively in Europe, living for a time in Spain where he was influenced by the material paintings of Antonio Tapies. During the 1960s and 70s Clarke exhibited with Gallery A, Melbourne and with the Powell Street Gallery, South Yarra. This small abstract painting by Clarke was one of the early acquisitions by Etta and Emmanuel Hirsh for their collection.

Peter Clarke became a highly influential artist in Melbourne and in 1981 he was made Head of the Fine Art Department at RMIT, where he remained until his retirement in 1990. Clarke participated in the major exhibitions Contemporary Australian Painting, Los Angeles and San Francisco, USA (1966); Australian Art Today (1968), touring Southeast Asia; and 12 Australian Painters (1983–4), Art Gallery of Western Australia.

The Deakin University Art Collection is home to an earlier work by Clarke from 1957 and is also home to a significant painting by his lifelong colleague and friend William Ferguson. Clarke continues to paint and make artwork based in the inner eastern suburbs of Melbourne.

Geoffrey PROUD

b. Australia, 1946; d. Australia, 2022

Nadine and Geoffrey 1967

Charcoal And Oil On Paper On Composition Board

2021.63

Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Irwin Hirsh in memory of Etta and Emmanuel Hirsh, 2021

About the artist and their work:

Geoffrey Proud was born and grew up in Adelaide, and without attending art school became an award-winning Australian artist. Proud held his first exhibition at the influential Watters Gallery, Sydney in 1967 followed by important exhibitions in Melbourne in the late 1960s. This painting by Proud was purchased in 1968 and was part of several early acquisitions by Etta and Emmanuel Hirsh for their growing collection.

By the 1970s Proud was well known across Australia for his Pop-inspired stylised figurative paintings behind glass and Perspex. In the 1980s Proud started working in a more fluid painterly style and in 1990 he won the Archibald Prize, Australia’s most prestigious art prize, for his portrait of writer Dorothy Hewett. Proud would later move to Tasmania where he continued to live and paint until his death.