A CHAPTER IN PRINT After four decades, Senior Curator of Australian Prints and Drawings, Roger Butler AM will retire this month. Here, he reflects on helping founding Director James Mollison form the print collection.
I was curating an exhibition of linocuts in Melbourne in 1981 when I was asked to fly to Canberra to interview for the position of Curator of
to open and I joined a small group of curatorial staff who were all
Australian Prints at the yet to be opened National Gallery.
involved in cataloguing the collection and selecting works for the opening
I was collected at the airport by a Commonwealth car and driven
exhibitions. I threw myself into reviewing the collection which had been
to Fyshwick where the Gallery had its store in the Molonglo Mall. I was
assembled to date: I looked at every work and updated and corrected the
ushered into an informal office area where Director James Mollison and
existing records, which were all handwritten.
Senior Curator of Australian Art, Daniel Thomas, were poring over plans
I was pleased to see the Gallery already owned works by both Preston
for the new Gallery building. The first thing James asked me was: ‘Can
and Traill. I knew the Traill prints well as they had been exhibited in
you read plans?’. He then indicated where the Australian art displays
Melbourne by Jim Alexander at his Important Women Artists gallery in
would be and explained how prints would be an integral part of the hang
1977. Among the works the National Gallery acquired was one of her most
which would incorporate all media.
significant prints, Good night in the gully where the white gums grow,
What struck me most about James was his ambition for the National
1922. It is an audacious work; made at a time when etchings were usually
Gallery to become one of the great institutions of the world. The
small and dark, Traill’s print is large scale and has great luminosity. She
Australian collection was central to this vision and he was determined
demonstrated complete control of the aquatint process, a technique she
that the Gallery would become the centre for the display, interpretation
had learned with Frank Brangwyn in Bruges, Belgium and in London.
and study of Australian art. He envisaged the collection as authoritative,
It is the poetic nature of the image that attracts me. Three slender,
representing Aboriginal artists and artists working in all states and
light-toned eucalypts dominate the composition, their trunks extend
territories. He wanted senior curatorial staff with wide-ranging
beyond the top and bottom of the image, creating strong vertical accents
knowledge and specialisations. The Gallery was to be the leader in all
on a sloping hillside; behind them the darker scrub is silhouetted against
aspects of museology: curatorial, registration, education or conservation.
the fading light. The title may be a line from a poem.
James and I discussed the women artists who had been such a
Fred Williams was a member of the Gallery’s Council at the time this
prominent force in the Australian modernist art movement of the early
work was acquired, and one can recognise its relationship to his own
twentieth century, and the Director wanted to know which artists I
etchings of the Australian landscape. I can imagine him applying his test
thought the Gallery should represent in depth. I suggested Margaret
for whether or not a work was resolved, which was to ask: “How does it
Preston and Jessie Traill. Each in their own way had a distinctive view
look upside down?”.
of the landscape and vegetation, especially gum trees and native flowers. James was in a hurry to put ideas into action. He asked: ‘Can you start next week?’. I was taken aback, but replied: ‘What about the week after?’
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My interview took place 18 months before the Gallery was scheduled
nga.gov.au
An early purchase after the Gallery opened was a rare and exceptional colour stencil print produced by Margaret Preston when she was 78. At the time she was synthesizing the significant influences on her life
