2013.Q1 | Artonview 73 Autumn 2013

TU R NE R

N AT I O N A L G A L L E RY O F A U S T R A L I A , C A N B E R R A

FROM THE TATE

THE MAKING OF A MASTER

AUTUMN 2013 | 73

PRESENTING PARTNERS

MAJOR PARTNERS

ORGANISED BY

SUPPORTING PARTNER

JMW Turner Regulus 1828 (detail), reworked 1837, Tate, London, accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest, 1856. Photograph © Tate, 2013

AUTUMN 2013 | 73

Making connections across Australia and beyond For over 125 years Maddocks lawyers have helped clients understand the law, negotiate agreements and resolve disputes.

Celebrating 1 year in Canberra.

Maddocks law firm is the proud legal partner of the National Gallery of Australia and is deeply committed to supporting arts in Australia.

Canberra | Sydney | Melbourne www.maddocks.com.au

AUTUMN 2013 | 73

Published quarterly by the National Gallery of Australia, PO Box 1150, Canberra ACT 2601, Australia artonview.editor@nga.gov.au | nga.gov.au

2

© National Gallery of Australia 2013

4

Copyright of works of art is held by the artists or their estates. Apart from uses permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part of Artonview may be reproduced, transmitted or copied without the prior permission of the National Gallery of Australia.

Director’s word

EXHIBITIONS Poster mania: Toulouse-Lautrec and nineteenth-century Paris

Simeran Maxwell

10 Traill-blazer Roger Butler

12

From initiation to death and beyond

Crispin Howarth

ENQUIRIES copyright@nga.gov.au

14

Tate’s Turners: an unrivalled collection comes to Australia

Produced by the National Gallery of Australia Publishing Department

18

American street: seventy years of a photographic tradition

EDITOR Eric Meredith DESIGNER Kristin Thomas PHOTOGRAPHY by the National Gallery of Australia Photography Department unless otherwise stated RIGHTS AND PERMISSIONS Nick Nicholson PRINTER Geon, Sydney PREVIOUS ISSUES nga.gov.au/Artonview ISSN 1323‑4552 PRINT POST APPROVED pp255003/00078 RRP A$9.95 | FREE TO MEMBERS MEMBERSHIP membership@nga.gov.au nga.gov.au/Members TEL (02) 6240 6528 FAX (02) 6270 6480 WARNING Artonview may contain the names and images of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people now deceased.

(cover and opposite) Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec The toilette (Combing her hair) 1891 (detail) oil on cardboard, 58 x 46 cm The Ashmolean Museum, Oxford bequeathed by Frank Hindley Smith, 1939

Tête-à-tête supper (In a private room— At the ‘Rat Mort’) (Portrait of Lucy Jourdain) c 1899 oil on canvas, 55.1 x 46 cm The Samuel Courtauld Trust, The Courtauld Gallery, London

20 23

Christine Dixon

Anne O'Hehir

Home and away: Australian paintings of the Federation era

Miriam Kelly

Location unDisclosed: touring the second triennial Mary-Lou Nugent

FEATURES 24 26 28 30 31

To London to celebrate: Australia exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts

Maryanne Voyazis

Your National Gallery’s 30th anniversary

Ron Radford

Masterpieces for the Nation Fund 2013: Florence Fuller’s A golden hour

Anne Gray

Sculpture symposium: striking a resonance in Canberra

Michelle Fracaro

Living art, the art of living: Andrea Zittel’s A–Z Homestead unit 2012

Lucina Ward

ACQUISITIONS 32 Banks Islands sculptures 34 Peter Kennedy A language of the dead 35 Kathy Temin Tombstone garden 36 Charles Firnhaber The Royal Exchange Cup and JM Skipper Cummins House 38 Stephen Bird John Glover’s paint tray 39 WB Gould Cat o’ nine tails 40 Ron McBurnie Tobias and the angel 41 Mon-Dvaravati period Standing Buddha

REGULARS 42 Facesinview 44 News from the Foundation 45 Creative partnerships 46 Thank you … 48 Members news

Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, January 2013.

Director’s word This is Canberra’s centenary year and with it the national capital is celebrating like never before. The National Gallery of Australia officially launched the centenary celebrations with the opening of Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge in December 2012.

The show is doing exceptionally well, and with only a month left you have no time to waste if you have yet to see it. In June, we will stage Turner from the Tate: The Making of a Master, our first winter blockbuster in more than ten years. We then finish the year by bringing to Australia an exhibition of works from a unique culture, which we will reveal in the coming months—stay tuned! Indeed, with three blockbusters in twelve months, this is a great year to take advantage of the benefits of being a Gallery member.

In addition to these major exhibitions, an important retrospective of Jessie Traill, Australia’s greatest etcher of the first half of the twentieth century, is on display in the Project Gallery, while in our Orde Poynton Gallery we are showing an array of compelling sculptures and objects created for ritual events in Vanuatu in Kastom: art of Vanuatu. Both exhibitions are drawn from the national art collection and a number of the works were acquired recently. We also have an interesting collection display of American street photography from the 1930s to 2000s. Two of our touring exhibitions will be launched in early May: Capital and country: the Federation years 1900–1913 at

2 ARTONVIEW

Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, Darwin, and unDisclosed: 2nd National Indigenous Art Triennial at Anne and Gordon Samstag Museum of Art, Adelaide.

Capital and country is the first significant exhibition to consider parallel stories of Federation landscape painting in Australia and the art produced by Australians who lived in Europe during the period from the turn of the twentieth century to just before the First World War. Celebrating our Federation-period art, this touring exhibition is a gift to the nation during Canberra’s centenary year of 2013 and we look forward to taking it to audiences in nearly every state and territory.

Further afield and in partnership with one of the United Kingdom’s leading art institutions, Australia: land and landscape opens in September at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. The exhibition is the largest survey of Australian art ever held outside Australia and includes Indigenous and non-Indigenous works spanning 200 years. We invite Foundation and Gallery members to join us in London for this premier event (see page 24 for details).

In this issue, Simeran Maxwell highlights the poster mania that gripped Paris at the end of the nineteenth century, around the time of Lautrec’s first and immensely popular poster Moulin Rouge: La Goulue 1891. We have had our own poster mania at the Gallery over the last few years, with

nine of Lautrec’s finest posters acquired for the national art collection and, as members already know, another is the subject of our 2012–13 Members Acquisition Fund appeal.

Also in this issue, Senior Curator Christine Dixon introduces the upcoming Turner from the Tate. JMW Turner’s oil paintings and watercolours are highly coveted by museums and collectors and widely dispersed internationally. However, only from the Tate’s collection, bequeathed to the British people by the artist, do we gain a full sense of Turner’s achievements as one of Britain’s greatest artists and as a key figure of the European Romantic movement. He is celebrated as a highly modern painter, and his work is much admired for its experimental character.

Turner from the Tate highlights many of the artist’s most famous paintings as well as works rarely shown. This astonishing survey gives Australians the opportunity to journey through the artistic development of this most acclaimed and influential British artist.

Last year, we celebrated our thirtieth birthday with two important events: I gave a National Press Club address outlining a brief history of the Gallery and our vision for the coming years and Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum, delivered our anniversary lecture. Both were filmed and are available on our website.

Federation-period artist Florence Fuller’s A golden hour c 1905 is the subject of the

centenary year Masterpieces for the Nation Fund. It is one of Fuller’s most impressive landscapes. It captures the golden glow of the sun setting in the Western Australian bush with a portrait of two lovers. This is a masterpiece of the Australian Federation period and belongs among the other extraordinary works acquired through the past generosity of donors to the fund.

Also for the centenary, Canberra is celebrating its long love affair with public sculpture. The Gallery of course has a unique sculpture gallery and also the finest Sculpture Garden in the nation, but beyond that the ACT Government has commissioned many public sculptures over the years. In March, the Gallery hosts American sculptor and installation artist Andrea Zittel, who will erect one of her Homestead units in the Gallery’s Sculpture Garden and present a lecture on the project, which she began in 2001. Then, over two days in May, international sculptors and experts on sculpture will discuss the art form and its many facets at the Gallery’s symposium Sculpture: Space and Place.

In this issue of Artonview, we highlight a number of outstanding sculptural works recently acquired by the Gallery, including a group of works from Vanuatu’s Torba province, some of which are currently on display in Kastom: art of Vanuatu.

An exquisite eighth-century Mon-Dvaravati period Thai bronze Buddha was acquired

with the generous support of Dr David Pfanner and Dr Ruth Pfanner. The Gallery purchased two major Australian works dealing with the themes of mortality and renewal: Peter Kennedy’s neon work Language of the dead 1997–98 and Kathy Temin’s minimalistic but corporeal Tombstone garden 2012. A recent Australian ceramic by English-born Stephen Bird was also acquired; it takes a very different perspective on the English-born colonial Australian John Glover, who became the father of Australian landscape painting.

Bird imitates Glover’s palette in ceramic.

One particular coup for the Gallery is the recent acquisition of two South Australian works: Charles Firnhaber’s silver The Royal Exchange Cup 1849 and JM Skipper’s watercolour Cummins House, Adelaide, with John Morphett and family, and a group of seated Aborigines, in the foreground c 1850. Firnhaber was the first of the many well-known German silversmiths in South Australia and Skipper among the earliest South Australian painters. Both works can be linked back to one of South Australia’s founding fathers, Sir John Morphett, and his home, Cummins House, which is now open to the public. Along with other recent acquisitions, these works enhance the Gallery’s ability to tell a story of colonial South Australia through its art.

We don’t always associate humour with colonial painting; however, convict painter

WB Gould’s Cat o’ nine tails is a charming quip at the severe multi-tailed whip used to inflict harsh floggings in the penal colonies of early colonial Australia. Although a convict and somewhat of a repeat offender, Gould was an accomplished painter in watercolour and oil; the latter he learnt after arriving in Australia. He became known for his still lifes of fruit and flowers. Gould was emancipated in 1835 and, although he painted Cat o’ nine tails in 1848, long after the sting of ‘the cat’ had faded, the memory clearly remained. And it is one of the few images of a cat in colonial art.

Congratulations to Ita Buttrose AO, OBE, named Australian of the Year 2013.

Ms Buttrose was a Gallery Council member from 1990 to 1993. We are also proud that former Council chairmen Kerry Stokes AC (chairman from 1996 to 2000) and Harold Mitchell AC (chairman from 2001 to 2005) were also among the nominees for Australian of the Year this year.

In this festive and important year for the national capital, I hope you find your way several times to the celebrations in Canberra and to your National Gallery of Australia.

Ron Radford AM

ARTONVIEW 3

Aristide Bruant, in his cabaret 1893 (detail) brush and spatter lithograph, printed in four colours 128.3 x 96.5 cm Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney purchased 1945

POSTER MANIA Toulouse-Lautrec and nineteenth-century Paris Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge until 2 April 2013 | nga.gov.au/Toulouse

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec was once described by a contemporary critic as ‘the quintessential chronicler of Paris, as it is understood by those who come here seeking bright lights and wild pleasures’.

During his short but brilliant career, Lautrec created thirty vibrant posters advertising aspects of his adopted city and its inhabitants.

Among his most memorable designs were those for the dance halls, cabarets and the cafe-concerts that crowded France’s capital during the later half of the nineteenth century, featuring the performers who made the venues famous. He was also commissioned by his friends—including photographer Paul Sescau, novelist Victor Joze and even cutting-edge bicycle salesman Louis Bouglé—to create posters for their various ventures. When Lautrec’s first poster, Moulin Rouge: La Goulue, appeared on the walls of Paris in December 1891, it took the public and the art world by storm.

The large posters were taken down almost immediately by Parisians for display in their homes and private collections.

The French term ‘affichomanie’ (poster mania), coined in the same year as Lautrec’s first poster was released, describes the fever that swept Pairs in the wake of those large, colourful lithographs that appeared on the capital’s streets. Earlier, in 1863, the Morris printing company had invented what became known as the Morris column, used for the express purpose of pasting up advertising posters. The columns crowded the boulevards of Paris and are still an icon of the city today.

The artist Jules Chéret, known as the father of posters, had produced lively and colourful images advertising various Paris nightspots from 1866. Although posters existed prior to his arrival in Paris, Chéret brought colour and size to the medium.

Following in his footsteps, not so many years later, Lautrec added his own personal stamp, propelling posters into the field of fine art. Lautrec’s designs broke significantly with the pre-eminent style of the 1870s and 1880s: they were considerably bolder than those that had come before. Although he continued to capture the gaiety of the

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 5

Caudieux 1893 brush and spatter lithograph, printed in four colours 129 x 95.4 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra The Poynton Bequest, 2011

(opposite) May Milton 1895 brush, crayon, spatter and transfer screen lithograph, printed in five colours 79.5 x 62 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra The Poynton Bequest, 2010

May Belfort 1895 brush, crayon and spatter lithograph, printed in four colours 79.5 x 62 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra The Poynton Bequest, 2012

Moulin Rouge and other nightspots for which Chéret had become so renowned, Lautrec used bold blocks of colour and eerie silhouettes. He developed his particular lithographic style from many of the key elements of the Japanese prints that were particularly popular in France in the second half of the nineteenth century, which Lautrec collected avidly. The vibrant and pure colours of his posters are quite different from the pastel shades found in much of his oil painting.

Moulin Rouge: La Goulue differed from other posters of the period. Instead of populating his posters with fictitious women (Chéret’s creations were known as

6 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

‘Chérettes’), Lautrec posed the real dancer La Goulue (The Glutton) as a central figure in the image, shown performing the chahut, her notorious version of the can‑can, which she occasionally performed without knickers. The grey silhouette of her dance partner Valentin le Désossé (The Boneless) appears in the foreground, and the audience in black behind. The poster is divided into three sections because printing presses were not large enough to print its enormous size on one sheet. Its radical design, colour and size meant that it was described at the time as a ‘fist in the face’. Despite its immediate success, copies of Moulin Rouge: La Goulue have become scarce.

Hoping to ride the coattails of the Moulin Rouge poster’s success, other nightclubs were eager for Lautrec to create posters to advertise their establishments. The shortlived cabaret Divan Japonais (which literally translates as ‘Japanese couch’) was one such venue. It opened in 1888 and was fitted out in a combination of the fashionable Chinese and Japanese styles. The poster Divan Japonais 1893 features two popular performers: the headless figure of singer Yvette Guilbert is recognisable in the background by her distinctive black elbowlength gloves and the dancer Jane Avril sits in the centre of the image enjoying the performance as a member of the audience.

Lautrec developed a unique style that was popular with the entertainers as well as the public. They quickly flocked to him to have posters made to advertise their particular performances. Among them were singers May Belfort and May Milton, reportedly lovers, who performed separately at various cafe-concerts. Belfort, an Irish woman, was popularly known for her child-like appearance and songs, while the English Milton was, by all accounts, far less talented.

Possibly because of the relationship between the two women, Lautrec created the two posters as pendants—Milton’s in a bold blue and white and Belfort’s in red and white.

For each popular performer for whom he made posters, Lautrec captured his or her own particular brand of entertainment. The singer-songwriter and cabaret impresario Aristide Bruant is shown in several posters as a haughty figure with his distinctive red scarf, black hat, cape and wooden cane.

Caudieux, a dancer and comedian known as ‘The Human Cannonball’, is shown barrelling across the poster, his outstretched arms cropped by the parallel edges of the poster. The comedian’s face is tinged with a rosy glow created through Lautrec’s new spatter technique in which he created a delicate gradation in colour by flicking tusche, the greasy substance used to draw

on the lithographic stone, off the end of his paint brush and across the design.

Alongside the dancehalls and nightspots of Paris, Lautrec also made posters for literary purposes. He was close friends with many authors and magazine editors who commissioned him to produce some of his most notorious images. Queen of pleasure 1892 became the book cover for an erotic novel by his friend Victor Joze. It shows the book’s protagonist, Alice Lamy, caressing the fat, old figure of the rich banker, Baron de Rozenfield, who financed the young demi-mondaine’s extravagant lifestyle.

Lautrec’s father, Count Alphonse, took a dim view of his son’s work with posters.

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 7

8 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

Queen of pleasure 1892 brush, spatter and transfer screen lithograph, printed in four colours 138.4 x 93 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra purchased with the assistance of Mary Peabody, 2011

(opposite) Jane Avril 1899 brush lithograph, printed in four colours 56 x 29.8 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra The Poynton Bequest, 2011

While able to accept Lautrec’s career as an artist with a reasonable amount of equanimity, he was outraged at the extremely public use of their noble family name on advertising posters around Paris, especially in association with unsavoury venues and performers. Lautrec saw his posters in a very different light, and he exhibited them proudly with his paintings from as early as 1892.

Lautrec’s serious health problems, exacerbated by a combination of venereal disease and alcoholism, meant that his artistic output slowed dramatically toward

the end of the 1890s. This and his erratic behaviour caused many of his previous cronies to distance themselves. Jane Avril, one of his favourite redheaded muses, remained a loyal companion. Their relationship lasted until the end, with her commissioning him to produce one of his last posters. Despite his failing health, Lautrec created a bold image of Avril clad in a black dress with a multicoloured serpent draped around her torso. This was the last of four posters of the dancer, all of which are owned by the National Gallery of Australia.

Over recent years, in preparation for Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge, the Gallery has purchased nine vibrant posters, and the acquisition of a tenth, Divan Japonais, is currently being supported by the 2012–13 Members Acquisition Fund. All are on display in the exhibition in the context of Lautrec’s paintings, prints, drawings and other exemplary posters drawn from thirty international and national collections.

Simeran Maxwell Assistant Curator, Exhibitions

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 9

TRAILL-BLAZER Stars in the river: the prints of Jessie Traill until 23 June 2013 | nga.gov.au/Traill

The three most important Australian printmakers from the early twentieth century would be the traditionalist Lionel Lindsay, the premier modernist Margaret Preston and Jessie Traill, who has an ambiguous position somewhere between the former two in terms of the style of her art.

Like many Australian artists, Traill spent the years of the First World War in Europe, contributing to the war effort through her work as a nurse. On her return to Australia she re-engaged with printmaking. Many artists of her generation, particularly women, took up the new modern and decorative possibilities offered by the

10 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

woodcut and linocut. But it was etching, a technique dominated by men at the time, with which Traill passionately identified.

Traill’s return to Australia coincided with the popularisation of etching and the establishment of the Australian PainterEtchers’ Society. She was a foundation member of the society in 1920 and a regular exhibitor in the group’s exhibitions, but she never entered into the machinations between the Melbourne and Sydney practitioners nor the personal competitive animosity that existed between artists such as Lionel Lindsay and Sydney Long.

But, in terms of her reputation, Traill paid for this lack of engagement with

her peers involved in the Painter-Etchers’ movement. Her etched work never received the exposure it deserved in Australia.

Who else had had their etchings exhibited in the Royal Academy in London, the French Salons in Paris and the PanamaPacific International Exposition in San Francisco before 1920? Traill was a far more knowledgeable, travelled, exhibited and exciting print artist than any of her Australian contemporaries. Yet her work was overlooked by the influential taste‑making magazine Art in Australia and the popular society magazine The Home: only seven etchings by Traill were reproduced in Art in Australia, compared to 141 by her

The red light, Harbour Bridge, June 1931 1932 aquatint and etching, printed in brown ink with plate‑tone, from one plate; additional hand-colouring plate-mark 32.8 x 24.6 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra purchased 1987 © estate of Jessie Traill

(opposite) Evening Mallacoota, West 1924 etching and aquatint, printed in black ink with plate‑tone, from one plate plate-mark 15.2 x 55 cm National Gallery of Australia purchased 1983 © estate of Jessie Traill

The jewel necklace, Bland River and Lake Cowal, NSW 1920 etching and aquatint, printed in black ink with plate‑tone with wiped highlights, from one plate plate-mark 11.4 x 36.4 cm National Gallery of Australia purchased 1976 © estate of Jessie Traill

contemporary Lionel Lindsay. Nor was her work acquired extensively by public art galleries during her lifetime.

Traill’s friendships were in the arts more broadly, centring on the Arts and Craft Society of Victoria. It was a supportive group that embraced art in all its variety and frequently championed social work.

The two dominant themes in Traill’s etchings are nature and industry. As a practising Christian she revered nature, but she was also aware of changes wrought on it through development. The achievements of industry she regarded as equally awesome. She treated both themes with an understanding of the importance of

their presence in the world and also their poetic aspects.

The distinguishing feature of all Traill’s work is its inventive use of compositional structure accentuated by her outstanding grasp of the tonal possibilities of etching processes. There are large, dark, gritty images of industrial sites; delicate drypoints in the format of Japanese scrolls; a narrative triptych; expansive panoramas in broadly brushed aquatint; and other works where the aquatint is applied with a sensitivity rarely seen in printmaking. Some works verge on the abstract.

Stars in the river, the exhibition and monograph, is part of the National Gallery

of Australia’s ongoing commitment to bring into the public domain the work of leading Australian printmakers and to explore the significance of their contributions to the visual arts and cultural life in Australia.

Roger Butler Senior Curator, Australian Prints and Drawings This article is derived in part from the introduction to the monograph published in association with the Stars in the river: the prints of Jessie Traill. The book is available at selected bookstores nationally for $34.95 and at the NGA Shop for the special price of $24.95.

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 11

Kamanlyk Metaniele c 1972 wood, vegetable clay, ochre, fibre 87 x 80 x 25 cm purchased by J-M Charpentier on behalf of the Commonwealth Arts Advisory Board, 1971

(opposite) Kalit Iapekamavis village, Malakula, Malampa province, Vanuatu Nekempao c 1972 tree fern, vegetable clay, boar tusks, fibre, ochre 145 x 36 x 33 cm purchased by J-M Charpentier on behalf of the Commonwealth Arts Advisory Board, 1971

The artist Kamanlyk beside the Metaniele circumcision plaque, Lendamboe village, Malakula Island, probably November 1972.

Commonwealth Arts Advisory Board, Canberra (currently held by the South Australian Museum, Adelaide)

FROM INITIATION TO DEATH AND BEYOND Kastom: art of Vanuatu until 16 June 2013 | nga.gov.au/Kastom

One of the underpinning aspects of the art of central and north Vanuatu is the grade-taking system commonly called Nimangi. Although different communities have different versions of the grade system, art created for the spectacular events of taking a grade is a constant. The Gallery’s collection from the island of Malakula, partly on display in Kastom: art of Vanuatu, in particular includes a wide variety of impressive examples of the art created for various grade levels.

A lifetime of grade taking begins when a young man is initiated into the Nalawan society—in some areas, both men and women are initiated, although the practice

12 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

has lessened over the past fifty years. Two of the works in Kastom are associated with male initiation events, which include circumcision.

They are the Metaniele and the Nekempao.

The Metaniele is a looming circular plaque that would have once hung above the entrance to a men’s clubhouse during initiation events. The Nekempao is a figure reduced to a head, torso and genitalia and would have been displayed on the dance ground. The features of both objects are created from a clay-like paste and painted in bright ochres. Their noses are long and prominent, symbolising the penis. Their eyes are stalk-like protrusions. Such eyes on Malakulan works of art often reference

death; however, in the case of initiation objects such as these, they more likely refer to the pain of the initiation ceremony.

To each side of the face of the Metaniele are birds, a link to the ancestors. Birds are believed to transport the spirits of the ancestors to and from a village, and the presence of ancestors during grade-taking events is vital. The Nekempao, on the other hand, is overtly sexualised and is intended to represent the young initiate as a virile member of the community.

Being initiated is only the first step towards rising through Nimangi grade levels.

To achieve each level an individual must find a sponsor from the higher grade they

wish to obtain and to pay for the ritual events connected with that grade level.

The cost of such events are high and include commissioning impressive sculpture of specific types related to the grade level being attained and offering a number of pigs for public sacrifice in honour of the ancestors.

The number of levels within a grade system varies. Some have in excess of fifteen distinct grade levels and, with each level, a new name that reflects the achievement is bestowed upon the grade-taker.

Accompanying the new name and entry to a grade level are associated rites, knowledge and publicly recognised status, all of which equate to the individual gaining more

power through seniority and ceremonial authority within their community.

The levels of grade systems do not end with a persons passing. It is possible to make ritualised payments that extend life beyond death. The three ramparamp figures in Kastom are the physical transformations of the living into ancestors: to become a ramparamp is a great honour.

Each ramparamp body is made from tree fern, wood, bamboo and other materials, with a layer of paste-like vegetal clay giving a uniform and smoothed surface.

The objects also often include the skull of the deceased. The head of an ancestor is important—it is the residing place of the

soul, learning and wisdom. The skull is over modelled into an idealised portrait of the man then painted with the designs the man wore in his last grade-taking ceremony.

Funerary rituals extend over months, with the ramparamp appearing at the final public mourning events before permanently entering the men’s clubhouse.

The exhibition Kastom: art of Vanuatu is the first display of these works along with over fifty others that exemplify the boundless visual and cultural heritage of the islands of Vanuatu.

Crispin Howarth Curator, Pacific Arts, and curator of Kastom

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 13

14 ARTONVIEW | FEATURE

The fall of an avalanche in the Grisons exhibited 1810 (detail) oil on canvas 90.2 x 120 cm Tate, London accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest, 1856 Photograph © Tate, 2013

TATE’S TURNERS an unrivalled collection visits Australia Turner from the Tate: The Making of a Master 1 June – 8 September 2013 | nga.gov.au/Turner

Joseph Mallord William Turner was born in the city of London in 1775, during the reign of George III. He came from humble origins, his father working as a hairdresser in Covent Garden. By the end of Turner’s life—he died in Victorian times, in the year of the Great Exhibition in 1851—he was famous, even infamous, for his transformation of the art of painting. Now he is known as one of Britain’s greatest artists, a key figure of the Romantic generation, and is celebrated as a pioneer of modern painting, his work much admired for its experimental character.

This year, the National Gallery of Australia is to host forty of Turner’s oil paintings, as well as seventy drawings and watercolours. Almost all are from the unrivalled collection held in trust by the Tate for the British nation. The Tate holds the largest collection of Turner’s works in the world because of his bequest to the nation. It was originally limited to finished paintings exhibited in his lifetime, many of which the artist retained or reacquired

with a view to his legacy. The settlement of Turner’s will in 1856—after the gift was contested by his family—meant these works were supplemented by the contents of his house and studio.

Turner from the Tate: The Making of a Master reflects the diversity of the Tate’s unique collection. It provides a comprehensive overview of Turner and his artistic development, offering extraordinary insights into his working life and practices. Seen as a prodigy, Turner enrolled at the Royal Academy at the age of fourteen and was introduced to possible patrons and fellow artists such as the great portraitist Sir Joshua Reynolds (1723–1792). Several of Turner’s student figure studies and sketchbooks are included in the exhibition.

Also on show in Canberra are ambitious early oils such as landscapes of Northern England and the Lake District, featuring hills, rocks, water and other natural elements used to convey moods and emotions. Turner was rightly renowned as a great watercolour painter, and many of

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 15

his commissioned works were studies for portfolios of engravings. Scarborough c 1825, a preparatory sketch for Ports of England 1826–1828 watercolours, is filled with glowing light, showing his beloved English coast and people’s lives harvesting the sea’s bounty under the rocky domain of Scarborough Castle.

Included in the exhibition are dramatic Romantic events such as The fall of an avalanche in the Grisons exhibited 1810.

Turner, who had visited this region of the Swiss Alps in 1802, reshaped his memories in the light of press reports of a tragic storm of 1808, in which twenty-five people died.

Through the power of his imagining, we

16 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

become witnesses to the pitiless force of nature. The avalanche smashes puny human artefacts such as the small hut surrounded by churning snow and rocks under relentless wind and rain.

Elsewhere in the exhibition are the fruits of Turner’s greatest ambition: he wanted to be regarded as heir to the European Classical landscape tradition, to become ‘the English Claude’. He was familiar with the works of Claude Lorrain (1600–1682) through private collections and aspired to travel to Italy during the long decades when Britain was mainly cut off from the Continent by the Napoleonic Wars of 1792 to 1815.

He finally reached Italy in 1819, and his canvases blazed with the cerulean blue of Mediterranean skies. He essayed history paintings with heroic or poetic themes, idyllic pastorals and atmospheric, lightfilled glimpses of nature’s most beautiful ephemeral effects.

Turner travelled widely in Europe in the 1820s and 1830s, to France, Germany and Switzerland. Lake Lucerne was a particular favourite, and he made thousands of drawings on his journeys. He could make eight or nine pencil sketches in the time it took to make one colour study. He almost never painted in oils en plein air, and rarely in watercolour, waiting until his return

to his studio to execute his paintings.

Famously, his addition of layers of paint on ‘varnishing day’ at the Royal Academy was seen as a bravura attempt to outdo all the other artists.

Unlike many of his landscapes, the exact location of Sun setting over a lake c 1840 has not been identified. It is thought to be a recollection of a sunset at Lake Lucerne.

The sun’s burning orange rays reverberate over water and sky, spreading golden yellow light into the distance. The whiteness of the clouds and land suggests snow-capped mountains, while the texture of the paint surrounds us until we almost drown in its effect of shimmering beauty.

Turner’s skill, obsessions and range of subjects can be seen in this extraordinary exhibition derived from the best and most comprehensive collection of his art. It showcases his genius on paper and canvas, ranging from tiny sketches to gigantic oil paintings that demonstrate brilliantly how a master was made.

Christine Dixon Senior Curator, International Painting and Sculpture

Sun setting over a Lake c 1840 oil on canvas 91.1 x 122.6 cm Tate, London accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest, 1856 Photograph © Tate, 2013

(opposite) Scarborough c 1825 watercolour and graphite on paper 15.7 x 22.5 cm Tate, London accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest, 1856 Photograph © Tate, 2013

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 17

Walker Evans What, no garters? (Chicago) 1946 gelatin silver photograph 18.5 x 16.8 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra purchased 1980

(opposite, clockwise from top left) Lisette Model Running legs, Fifth Avenue, New York 1940/41 gelatin silver photograph, 49.5 x 39.6 cm purchased 1981

William Klein Christmas shoppers, near Macy’s, New York, 1954 1954 gelatin silver photograph, 29.7 x 40 cm purchased 1993

Helen Levitt New York 1972 dye transfer colour photograph, 35.6 x 42.9 cm purchased 1984

Saul Leiter Gumball machines 1955 (detail) direct positive colour photograph, 35.5 x 27.9 cm purchased 2000

AMERICAN STREET seventy years of a photographic tradition With its complexities and contradictions offering both images of wondrous progress and decline, redemption and ruin, the modern city has presented photographers with endless possibilities.

As the nineteenth century drew to a close, technical advancements in photography, including improved plate sensitivity to low-light conditions, shorter exposure times and more compact cameras, made it easier for photographers to take to the streets.

Famed art photographer, photo‑editor and publisher Around 1900, Alfred Stieglitz turned his attention to the glistening wet evening streets of his beloved New York.

These atmospheric scenes looked back

18 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

to Impressionism but also forward to the gritty urban studies of Paul Strand whose modernist work Stieglitz championed in 1913 in the last issue of his journal Camera Work.

America’s distinctive consumer culture, with its billboards and advertising signs, has been a well-explored subject in American photography since the 1930s. One of the photographers who found the vernacular of streetscapes a rich and evocative one was Walker Evans. The influence of his classically cool, unsentimental work is one that was long felt.

In the postwar era, there was a reaction against such conformist and homogenous

consumerism. The writers of the Beat era searched for meaning in the alleys of the cities and on road journeys across the towns and highways of an increasingly alienating and complicated society. Jack Kerouac’s On the road was published in 1957 and spoke to a disenchanted generation. It was an edgy, jazz-inspired roller-coaster ride in which he and his friends sought meaning in this ‘feverish and silly world’. Being on the road became a potent theme in popular culture.

The new wave of Abstract Expressionist painters in the 1950s stressed firsthand perception and direct experience.

They privileged process and subjectivity

and sought spontaneity. Photographers expressed the trend by getting out in the streets, establishing a genre of urban subject matter and portraiture.

Although the genre allowed for a poetic and meditative sensibility, it was often pursued in a way that celebrated the ever‑changing, exciting, energetic make-up of the street.

This impetus was summed up by Garry Winogrand, best known for his New York street images of the 1960s, who said in an interview with American journalist Bill Moyers that ‘when things move, I get interested’. In Bystander: a history of street photography, New York

photographer Joel Meyerowitz described the feeling as being: … like going into the sea and letting the waves break over you. On the street each successive wave brings a whole new cast of characters. You take wave after wave, you bathe in it. There is something exciting about being in the crowd, in all that chance and change—it’s tough out there—but if you can keep paying attention something will reveal itself—just a split second—and then there’s a crazy cockeyed picture!

the 1900s to the 1970s: Alfred Stieglitz, Paul Strand, Berenice Abbott, Walker Evans, Lisette Model, Helen Levitt, Harry Callahan, William Klein, Robert Frank, Saul Leiter, Leon Levinstein, Ernst Haas, Diane Arbus, Lee Friedlander, Garry Winogrand, Ed Ruscha, Larry Clark, Joel Meyerowitz, Stephen Shore.

Anne O’Hehir Assistant Curator, Photography

The Gallery’s current photography display American street: seventy years of a photographic tradition explores this subject and includes works by key figures from

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 19

HOME AND AWAY Australian paintings of the Federation era Capital and country: the Federation years 1900–1913 4 May – 29 September 2013 @ Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory nga.gov.au/Capital

20 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

The year 2013 marks a century since the foundation stones were laid for Australia’s capital city, Canberra. Penleigh Boyd’s painting The Federal capital site 1913 presents a grand vista over the golden pastoral plains and rolling hills selected as the future home of the Federal Government. The Federal Capital site is one of forty-eight works in the nationally touring exhibition Capital and country: the Federation years 1900–1913, developed as a gift to the nation as part of the National Gallery of Australia’s celebration of Canberra’s centenary.

Capital and country is the first exhibition from the National Gallery of Australia to bring together the parallel stories of Federation-era landscape painting in Australia and the art produced by Australians living and working in Europe from 1900 to 1913. Exploring the richness and diversity of paintings in oil, these works take us on a journey across continents, from sunlit gum trees in the Adelaide Hills to dimly lit artists’ studios in Paris, where sophisticated portraits were conceived.

Impressions of everyday moments are seen alongside those of historical significance, such as in Tom Robert’s luminous Sketch for opening of Federal Parliament, 1901, painted in Melbourne in May of 1901.

Roberts’s work introduces both the exhibition and the jubilant nationalist sentiment among many Australians in the years following the Federation of Australia’s six states in 1901, forming the Commonwealth of Australia. This momentous act excited Australians to search for a national identity distinct from Britain.

Art, particularly landscape painting, came to play an important role in this imagining.

Representations of the landscape provided the mainly European settler citizens of this new nation with a sense of identity and belonging within their vast surroundings.

With great fervour, Australians sought to experience Federation landscapes in their public galleries and through private patronage. Ideas of what might characterise a ‘typically Australian’ landscape, and an Australian ‘school of painting’ were hotly debated topic among artists, critics and viewers alike.

The Australian bush was romanticised.

Sunlight effects, gum trees, pastoral plains

and the trials and triumphs of bush life were elevated and heroicised, aided by works such as Hans Heysen’s The saplings 1904 and Harry Garlick’s The drover 1906.

The poetry and atmosphere of moments such as the glimmer of a new day, captured in Western Australian Florence Fuller’s Dawn landscape c 1905, or Frederick McCubbin’s rainbow over Melbourne’s Yarra River in Flood waters 1913, are latent with the excitement and national sentiment such landscapes evoked in this new era.

Concurrent with this enthusiastic nationalism, however, was a continuing reverence for the cultural centres of Europe.

These same thirteen years, 1900 to 1913, encompass the decadent Edwardian era in Britain and the last luxurious years of the Belle Époque in France. Like the Federation years, these periods really came to an end with the outbreak of the First World War. For any serious Australian painter, a pilgrimage to the art hubs of London and Paris was considered something of a rite of passage. Teachers, patrons and colleagues encouraged promising young artists like Hugh Ramsay, Max Meldrum and George W Lambert to study abroad and to see important works of European art history.

Artists sought to travel regardless of the

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 21

great expense, some supported by the recently established travelling scholarships, others by private patronage and many with their own meagre savings. While women were among the majority of art students in Australian schools at the time, scholarships were not then open to female students, and few were able to pursue painting as a profession. Significant artists like Hilda Rix Nicholas and Violet Teague were only able to travel abroad to study with the support of their families.

Portraiture and figure painting dominated the popular art scenes in which these Australian expatriates sought acceptance. Like many poor young students in Paris, Ramsay was often unable to afford a model with whom he might trial the new approaches he was learning in the academies. Ramsay painted his friends, dressed-up paupers and numerous striking self-portraits, including Self‑portrait c 1902. Lambert studied in Paris with Ramsay before settling in London, where he became one of the most successful Australian expatriates of his

22 ARTONVIEW | EXHIBITION

time, painting numerous commissioned society portrait and creating sophisticated, allegorical figure compositions such as The sonnet c 1907.

Capital and country includes many well-known and loved paintings from the national art collection, which are scarcely off display in Canberra.

However, alongside these firm favourites are many lesser-known paintings that will surprise and delight even the most avid visitor to the National Gallery, including works have been recently acquired, conserved or reframed for this exhibition.

As part of the National Gallery of Australia’s program of sharing the national art collection with every Australian, Capital and country will tour extensively, launching at the Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory in Darwin in May before visiting five other venues over the next three years.

Miriam Kelly Assistant Curator, Australian Paintings and Sculpture, and co-curator of Capital and country

Venues Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, NT, 4 May – 29 September 2013 Art Gallery of Ballarat, Vic, 26 October 2013 – 19 January 2014 Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Tas, 14 March – 11 May 2014 Riddoch Art Gallery, SA, 13 December 2014 – 22 February 2015 Newcastle Art Gallery, Newcastle, 7 March – 31 May 2015 UQ Art Museum, Qld, 25 July – 1 November 2015

George W Lambert The sonnet c 1907 oil on canvas 113.3 x 177.4 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra bequest of John B Pye, 1963

(page 20) Florence Fuller Dawn landscape c 1905 oil on canvas 44.5 x 60 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra purchased 2011

(page 21) Harry Garlick The drover 1906 oil on canvas board 60.8 x 45.4 cm National Gallery of Australia, Canberra purchased 1972

LOCATION UNDISCLOSED

The second National Indigenous Art Triennial on display at the National Gallery of Australia, May 2012.

touring the second triennial unDisclosed: 2nd National Indigenous Art Triennial 3 May – 7 July 2013 @ Anne & Gordon Samstag Museum of Art nga.gov.au/unDisclosed

In May 2012, the National Gallery of Australia exhibited some of the nation’s best contemporary Indigenous art in unDisclosed: 2nd National Indigenous Art Triennial. Twelve months on, the triennial’s national tour is set to begin at Adelaide’s Anne & Gordon Samstag Museum of Art. It will then travel to the Western Plains Cultural Centre in Dubbo in August and to its final venue at the Cairns Regional Gallery in northern Queensland at the end of October.

The exhibition celebrates the work of twenty Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists who are at the cutting edge of Australian contemporary art.

It features a range of styles and media and highlights the boundless diversity of Indigenous art from regions across Australia. As Indigenous guest curator Carly Lane comments: ‘It explores the artists’ motivations and inspirations and hints at the undercurrent of knowledge, stories and histories that artists reveal— or choose not to reveal—in their work’.

At once sophisticated, challenging and innovative, the works in unDisclosed encourage visitors to reassess and revaluate preconceptions of Indigenous art while celebrating its energy and excellence. The exhibition will build on the success and outcomes of the first National

Indigenous Art Triennial, which toured nationally and internationally from 2007 to 2009, and will generate greater audience awareness of Australian cultural material.

Mary-Lou Nugent Project Officer, Travelling Exhibitions

Also touring in autumn Roy Lichtenstein: Pop remix Araluen Arts Centre, NT, 26 April – 10 June Stars of the Tokyo Stage: Natori Shunsen’s kabuki actor prints Rockhampton Art Gallery, Qld,1 March – 2 June Capital and country: the Federation years 1900–1913 Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory, NT, 4 May – 29 September

EXHIBITION | ARTONVIEW 23

24 ARTONVIEW | FEATURE

The Royal Academy of Arts, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London.

Photograph: Travel Ink/Gallo Images/Getty Images

TO LONDON TO CELEBRATE Australia exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts

In just over six months, the Royal Academy of Arts in London will open Australia: land and landscape, the most ambitious survey of Australian art ever to be held outside Australia.

The National Gallery of Australia has partnered with the Royal Academy to present the story of our nation, our land and our history on an international stage, and we invite Foundation and Gallery members to come with us to London on a specially organised tour in September to celebrate this landmark exhibition.

The Royal Academy has an impressive track record of presenting major exhibitions that attract large audiences in the centre of London. This partnership is a great opportunity to present Australia’s strong visual arts traditions, including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art, to European audiences and to the many international visitors that visit London every year.

The exhibition will be shown in the main galleries of the Royal Academy and includes 200 images of Australia’s vast land from 1800 to now.

A particular highlight of the trip will be a Director’s dinner at the Royal Academy, with a tour of the exhibition.

The itinerary also includes exclusive visits to other London galleries as well as special behind-the-scenes visits to some of the city’s premier cultural attractions. Participants will also have the opportunity to meet significant members of the visual arts community in London.

This is a rare chance to celebrate on a large scale and in another country the wonderful and diverse nature of Australia and the art and artists of our states and territories. We hope you will join us as ambassadors of our nation for this great Australian art initiative.

For more information or to register your expression of interest, please contact Maryanne Voyazis, Executive Director of the Foundation, on (02) 6240 6691 or maryanne.voyazis@nga.gov.au, or Liz Wilson, Manager, Membership and Development Programs, on (02) 6240 6469 or liz.wilson@nga.gov.au.

Maryanne Voyazis Executive Director, National Gallery of Australia Foundation

FEATURE | ARTONVIEW 25

YOUR NATIONAL GALLERY’S 30TH ANNIVERSARY

26 ARTONVIEW | FEATURE

Ron Radford and Neil MacGregor in front of John Olsen’s Sydney sun 1965 at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 13 November 2012.

Image courtesy The Canberra Times. Photograph: Graham Tidy

Although the National Gallery of Australia is the youngest national gallery in the world, we have made many great strides in our short thirty-year history to educate people about art through our amazing collections and exhibitions. To celebrate this history, and indeed our plans for future, we hosted two important events last year: a National Press Club address, which I presented on 10 October (just two days before our thirtieth birthday on 12 October), and the Gallery’s anniversary lecture, given by Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum.

In my National Press Club address I outlined our collection history and collecting policy, which was first described in the Gallery’s founding document, the Lindsay Report of 1966. For a national gallery that was established so late, its collection had to complement rather than compete with the existing collections of the older state galleries; of course, the Australian art collection also had to stand on its own as the premier collection in the country—and it does. Also, for a nation only two centuries old, Australia’s national gallery could not, nor should it try, to emulate the national museums of old Europe and America.

It was instead to be a national gallery of the ‘New World’.

The address was a great opportunity to highlight the facts and figures that many Australians do not know about their national art collection and to recall our many great achievements—in bringing art to the nation, increasing access to the arts, developing programs that illuminate the value of art, and presenting and preserving art for the benefit of all Australians. I won’t elucidate on these milestones here, as my address can be viewed on our website, but I do wish to acknowledge the great contributions of my

directorial predecessors—James Mollison, Betty Churcher and Brian Kennedy—and of the Gallery’s chairmen over the past thirty years—L Gordon Darling, the Hon Gough Whitlam, the late Hon Lionel Bowen, Kerry Stokes, Harold Mitchell, Rupert Myer and Tim Fairfax.

For the first time on a national platform I also spoke about our future plans for Stage 2, The Centre for Australian Art. This bold project, which remains the only unfulfilled part of our 2005 vision statement, will put the Australia’s visual culture in pride of place, displayed prominently, beautifully, spaciously and proudly on the main, ground floor of the building, as other national galleries around the world have done for their own nation’s art. But the Centre for Australian Art is much more than an expanded building to house the largest and only balanced collection of our visual culture, a truly national collection, it is also a definitive statement by a proud nation celebrating its sophisticated culture.

The second of our thirtieth-anniversary events was the annual lecture, which the Gallery has hosted every year since our tenth anniversary in 1992. Robert Hughes, who passed away on 6 August 2012, was the first distinguished speaker in the series to present his piece of mind, which he did so well and with undeniable authority and eloquence throughout his career.

The second guest of the series was Neil MacGregor, then director of the National Gallery in London.

It was appropriate then that MacGregor honoured Hughes’s memory by titling his 2012 lecture ‘The shock of the thing’, cleverly adapting the title of Hughes’s premier book and BBC television series The shock of the new.

Tickets for the lecture sold out almost immediately after we announced the speaker, and rightly so. MacGregor has had an illustrious career, and it is hard to imagine a more robust and determined defender of the principles of the Enlightenment museum. He has called the British Museum ‘the first Open University’ and worked closely with BBC radio and television to achieve this aim.

Indeed, the British Museum and the BBC collaborated in 2010 on a project telling a history of the world in one hundred objects. At the heart of this project was a radio series of one hundred fifteenminute episodes about objects from the British Museum’s collection. The book from the series has now been translated into many languages.

In a way, MacGregor’s lecture summarised the idea behind the A History of the World in 100 Objects project, and that idea was MacGregor’s own revelation about the ‘universality of human experience and the response to it’, an idea born out his thirty years of experience observing countess objects from all over the world and from as far back as two million years ago.

Of course, the shock of thing for MacGregor is not only his realisation of a shared visual language but also that ‘one and a half million years ago we were already all hardwired for symmetry, for pattern, for beauty. The aesthetic imperative is almost as old as the need to eat’. He illustrated this point with objects from the British Museum, and with humour. His fascinating, insightful and unmissable lecture was filmed and can be viewed on the Gallery’s website.

Ron Radford Director

FEATURE | ARTONVIEW 27

28 ARTONVIEW | FEATURE

MASTERPIECES FOR THE NATION 2013 Florence Fuller’s A golden hour Contribute to the acquisition of this masterful oil by Federation-period artist Florence Fuller. For further information or to make your tax‑deductible donation, call (02) 6240 6454 or fill out and return the donation form in the Masterpieces for the Nation 2013 brochure.

The sun is slowly setting and sends a warm glow over the grasses and wildflowers, lighting up the trunks of the white gums.

A couple walk side by side through the wildflowers into the valley. There are pink tinges to the sky above the low-lying hills. And we can almost hear the chirp of birds in the great gum trees so typical of Australian landscapes painted in the first decades of the twentieth century.

This is Florence Fuller’s A golden hour c 1905, a painting portraying that magic hour at the end of the day. The place is the Darling Ranges in Western Australia, and the couple are John Winthrop Hackett, businessman, philanthropist and owner of the West Australian newspaper, and his new wife Deborah Vernon Hackett, née Drake-Brockman, who had married Hackett in 1905, aged eighteen, despite family disapproval. The painting may also be seen to represent their ‘golden hour’—Lady Hackett later became Lady Moulden of Adelaide and then, after marrying again, she was known as Dr Buller Murphy of Melbourne.

On 31 October 1905, The Western Australian observed that this painting was undoubtedly the pièce de résistance of Fuller’s recent exhibition. The critic admired the balance of the composition as a whole, and the treatment of the hills and sky but most of all praised ‘the wonderful light effects’, ‘the golden glories of late afternoon’.

Fuller is an important Australian woman artist and arguably Western Australia’s most significant artist from the Federation period. Born in Port Elizabeth in South

Africa and moving to Victoria as a child, Fuller studied art at the National Gallery School in Melbourne. In 1889, she was awarded the Victorian Artists’ Society prize for the best portrait by an artist under the age of twenty-five. She subsequently studied with her relative Robert Dowling, who was Melbourne’s most sought-after portraitist of the early to mid 1880s and Australia’s first locally trained artist. (Dowling’s oil portrait Miss Robertson of Colac (Dolly) 1885–86 was purchased in 2010 by donors to the Masterpieces for the Nation Fund.)

When Dowling died, Fuller took over Dowling’s portrait of Lady Loch, the Governor’s wife, who became a patron.

Fuller furthered her studies at the Académie Julian in Paris and exhibited in the Paris Salon, Royal Academy and Royal Institute of Oil Painters. In 1904, she moved to Perth to join her sister the singer Amy Fuller and remained there for four productive years. It was at that time she painted A golden hour, as well as an insightful portrait of Deborah Vernon Hackett. She was an active member of the Perth Theosophical Society and, upon leaving Western Australia, visited the Theosophists headquarters in Calcutta.

After a period in England, she returned to Australia, living in Mosman in New South Wales until her death in 1946.

Anne Gray Head of Australian Art Florence Fuller A golden hour c 1905 oil on canvas 108.5 x 103.5 cm

FEATURE | ARTONVIEW 29

Maria Fernanda Cardoso Intromitent organs of Tasmanian harvestman models after electronic microscope scans 2008–09 (details) resin, glass, metal 28 x 78 x 6 cm (overall) National Gallery of Australia, purchased 2012 Image courtesy Arc One Gallery

SCULPTURE SYMPOSIUM striking a resonance in Canberra As part of Canberra’s centenary-year celebrations, the National Gallery in collaboration with the Australian National University’s Research School of Humanities and the Arts, and its School of Art, presents Sculpture: Space and Place, a two-day symposium on 10 to 12 May presenting a context for discussion on sculpture from national and international perspectives.

In addition to continuing the debate about public art, a topic with particular resonance in Canberra, the symposium will bring together artists, curators and art writers to discuss sculpture in its various forms and contexts. Speakers will explore themes such as ‘the commissioning process’, ‘spectacle and innovation’, ‘space and nature’, ‘place’, ‘light’ and ‘memorial’.

30 ARTONVIEW | FEATURE

On the Friday night, London-based art consultant Vivien Lovell will launch the symposium with the keynote address ‘Challenges and controversies in public art’.

This free lecture is part of the Centenary of Canberra’s Big Issues/Big Talk program.

Internationally acclaimed Australian artist Patricia Piccinini and Centenary of Canberra Creative Director Robyn Archer will discuss Piccinini’s commissioned work, which is in the form of a hot air balloon.

Deborah Hart, Senior Curator of Australian Painting and Sculpture, will give the inaugural Neil Roberts memorial lecture, titled ‘Rosalie Gascoigne and Neil Roberts: a great Canberra legacy’, celebrating two of Australia’s most significant artists in recent history.

Other presenters include artists Peter Kennedy (Australia), Maria Fernanda Cardoso (Australia), Chris Drury (UK) and Wolfgang Buttress (UK) and National Gallery of Australia curators Deborah Hart, Lucina Ward and Miriam Kelly. Detailed information on speakers, topics and sessions can be found at nga.gov.au/Forums.

The symposium is a highlight of the TOUCH: Sculpture and the Land program taking place across Canberra in May. More information about the Sculpture: Space and Place symposium and additional sculpturerelated events can be found at the Canberra 100 website, canberra100.com.au.

Michelle Fracaro Program Coordinator, Learning and Access

LIVING ART, THE ART OF LIVING Andrea Zittel’s A–Z homestead unit 2012 American artist Andrea Zittel is known for her idiosyncratic approach to space, everyday life and its organisation. She makes sculpture and other objects, clothing, filing systems, caravans and desert islands. The Gallery has specially commissioned Zittel to produce A–Z homestead unit (commission for the National Gallery of Australia) 2012.

The work is inspired by Western homestead cabins, notions of frontier and perceptions of freedom and will be on display in the Sculpture Garden in March 2013.

Zittel has sustained a fascinating career over twenty years and is now one of America’s most highly respected artists.

Since the early 1990s, she has made art in response to her own surroundings and daily routines: the first Living units

were produced as a practical response to constantly moving her studio in the highly urbanised space of New York.

Subsequently, she launched her own corporation, A–Z Administrative Services, to provide customised uniforms and work spaces to a broader clientele. Her trailer units, escape vehicles and islands appeal to a fantasy of self-sufficiency and nomadic existence.

In 2000, Zittel moved to A–Z West, a 250‑acre site in the Californian desert, and now works between there and New York.

At A–Z West she and her collaborators have established an ‘Institute of Investigative Living’, an ongoing enterprise that examines aspects of daily living to better understand human nature and the social construction

of need. The physical components of the investigations—home furniture, clothes and textiles, structures for personal hygiene— are designed by the artist; their parameters accord with her approach to simplicity, pragmatism and functionality. All Zittel’s projects combine keen observation with humour.

Zittel will talk about the Gallery’s A–Z homestead unit and the inhabitation of the sculpture in a free lecture on Thursday 7 March 2013 at 6.00 pm.

Lucina Ward Curator, International Painting and Sculpture Andrea Zittel at A–Z West 2010.

Image courtesy Andrea Rosen Gallery, New York.

Photograph: Giovanni Jance

FEATURE | ARTONVIEW 31

Chief Wogales Pwetebut village, Gaua, Torba province, Vanuatu Protective image (Tamate rial) early to mid 20th century stone 36 x 35 x 18 cm purchased 2012

(opposite) Malampa and Torba provinces Fern figures mid 20th century tree fern 210–352 cm purchased 2012

Torba province Vanuatu

sculptures mid 20th century, tree fern, wood, stone, various dimensions, purchased 2012

The majority of these recently acquired sculptures are created from the mesh-like fibrous root system of the resilient tree fern. Generally called ‘tamat’, they represent important spirits and are placed under the protective eaves of the home of their high‑ranking owners or at the side of the dance ground among a line of sacred plants.

The works come from the islands of Vanua Lava and Gaua in the Torba province (more commonly known as the Banks Islands) of northern Vanuatu. Both islands had ceremonial societies known as Sukwe or Suque with which these works are associated. They are some of the finest examples to be seen outside of Vanuatu itself.

Several of the sculptures have recognisable human features realised within indigenous style canons that, to our eyes, border on the surreal. The range of imagery includes disembodied faces, lizards and designs resembling body-tattoo markings. The fern figure Tamat metelo, for example, has not only a face on its head but its stylised body also becomes a face. When creating figures, artists of Torba province often reduce the tree fern to its core for

32 ARTONVIEW | ACQUISITION

the body and keep the mesh sections to sculpt the head, legs and arms, as can be seem on Tamat salwor.

The collection depicts a number of spirits connected to ceremonial societies of the province. The singular stone Tamate rial, meaning ‘eater of men’, is an important object connected to sorcery and was sculpted by an artist with masterful ability in visual form.

These ten works from the Torba province were acquired from the private collection of Paul Gardissat during a visit to Vanuatu last year to seek cultural advice and permission for the exhibition Kastom: art of Vanuatu. Together, they now represent the strongest collection of works from this area in any art gallery. They are also significant in that records exist identifying the indigenous owners or creators of most of these works. Gardissat also provided a generous gift of a Tamate dance mask.

Crispin Howarth Curator, Pacific Art

ACQUISITION | ARTONVIEW 33

Peter Kennedy A language of the dead 1997–98, neon light installed on a black wall, 312 x 646 x 30 cm, purchased 2012

Peter Kennedy brings a depth of experience to his experimental works. He has long been interested in the interplay between the collective and the individual, between personal and public concerns.

Kennedy was a founding member, with Mike Parr and Tim Johnson, of the Inhibodress artists’ space in Sydney, which became a venue for experimental art in the early 1970s. He was also one of Australia’s first neon artists with early innovative exhibitions of his neon works at Gallery A in Sydney in 1970 and 1971 activating the architectural spaces of the gallery. In the same decade, his banners, films and installations related directly to the political and social context of the times.

Kennedy’s blue neon work Language of the dead is a major acquisition that relates to the death of ideologies and the way that language shapes and reshapes our thinking over time; eventually, some concepts become obsolete, although their afterglow continues to haunt us.

34 ARTONVIEW | ACQUISITION

Across the globe, ideologies have contributed to many conflicts in the twentieth century. In this work, words such as ‘communism’, ‘bourgeoisie’, and ‘socialism’ glow against a black ground; they are outlines, shapes appearing on the edge of disappearance. As Juliana Engberg remarked in her catalogue essay for the 1998 exhibition Peter Kennedy: requiem for ghosts, Kennedy’s neon words are like ‘fading moments of modern political consciousness; yet still legible, still sending out their auras, perhaps awaiting refocusing’.

This powerful work is not didactic but open-ended and poetic. It reminds us that how we use words as individuals and communities has far-reaching consequences and that, ultimately, language is not static but continually evolving.

Deborah Hart Senior Curator, Australian Painting and Sculpture post 1920 Image courtesy Milani Gallery, Brisbane

Kathy Temin Tombstone garden 2012, synthetic fur, synthetic polymer paint, synthetic stuffing, steel, composition board, 230 x 429 x 180 cm, purchased 2012

Kathy Temin’s Tombstone garden relates to the idea of memorials.

Her preoccupation with sites of loss and memory is inflected with aspects of her own history as a descendent of Jewish immigrants but also relates to the idea of memorials more generally. Her work is an Australian landscape of mind, part of the fabric of our place incorporating cross-cultural memories that shape our collective consciousness. Migrations across time and place are part of the substance of who we are.

The whiteness of Temin’s work is a kind of sublimation and reclamation. As the artist noted in an interview with Pricilla Pitts for the 1995 exhibition Materiality and metamorphosis in New Plymouth, New Zealand, her focus is on ‘reworking minimalism so it takes on an appearance of what it represses—the body, sentiment and memory’. In this way, the work has strong parallels with American artist Eva Hesse’s unconventional use of materials, which is equally visceral and symbolic.

In Tombstone garden, the scale of small and large topiary forms of trees and rocks have a bodily relationship. They rise up from the tombstones and are one with them. Covered in soft fur, her forms are reminiscent of childhood toys suggesting comfort and protection. The various components are wrapped up in contrasting aspects of nature and culture, hard and soft, constructed and handmade, loss and the possibility of renewal.

It is through Temin’s insights and sensitivity that a work like Tombstone garden encourages us to reflect on the past in the present while remembering that our dreams for a better future reside in our hands.

Deborah Hart Senior Curator, Australian Painting and Sculpture post 1920

ACQUISITION | ARTONVIEW 35

Charles Firnhaber The Royal Exchange Cup 1849, sterling silver, 30 cm, 13.2 cm (diam), purchased 2012

JM Skipper Cummins House, Adelaide, with John Morphett and family, and a group of seated Aborigines in the foreground c 1850, watercolour, 38.7 x 50.8 cm, purchased 2012

Two recently acquired works, a silver racing trophy and a watercolour, provide an unusually personal domestic link to early colonial life in South Australia. The presentation silver cup, with its repoussé decoration of leaves and flowers, was produced in 1849 by Adelaide silversmith Charles Eduard Firnhaber and the watercolour was painted around 1850 by JM Skipper. They are connected through their association with one of South Australia’s most important early citizens, Sir John Morphett, who was knighted in 1870 for his services to the state.

Firnhaber was born in Germany in 1805 and trained in the art of silversmithing and associated clock-making, jewellery and dentistry work. He was among the earliest German settlers in the state, having arrived from Bremen on 24 March 1847. It is probable that he first worked for the Adelaide jewellers George Griffin, established 1840, and definitely with John Henry Pace, established 1841. At the time, both firms were exploiting the newly found South Australian silver

36 ARTONVIEW | ACQUISITION

ore deposits at the Wheal Gawler mine. By 1849, Firnhaber had established his business, CE Firnhaber, and was commissioned by prominent people and businesses to design and make presentation, civic and ecclesiastical silver objects. He advertised his business until 1875 and died in Adelaide on 25 July 1880.

This cup was commissioned by the Adelaide publican, race promoter, theatre manager and actor George Selth Coppin. Known informally as ‘The Coppin Cup’, it was the first major item of commissioned silver to be made in South Australia. Named after Coppin’s Royal Exchange Hotel, the cup was presented to the winner of the 1850 Adelaide New Year Races, the noted sportsman Charles Brown Fisher. It is of elegant German baroque revival form and fine craftsmanship and bears the inscription: ‘Adelaide Races, 2ndJany, 1850, Royal Exchange Cup, presented by, Mr. George Coppin, and won by, Mr. Chas. Fisher’s B.G. Highflyer, Carrying 12 stone 3 Mile Heats’.

Fisher’s sister, Elizabeth, was married to Morphett, who was already a prominent and influential member of the colony, and the cup was passed down through the Morphett family. Fisher and Morphett had arrived as colonists in South Australia in 1836, coincidentally the same year that Skipper arrived.

Skipper was one of the earliest South Australian painters. His enthusiasm for sketching meant he soon became popular. He was known for his skilfully observed drawings and paintings of people, landscape and natural history.

His Cummins House, Adelaide, with John Morphett and family, and a group of seated Aborigines, in the foreground depicts the Morphett home in Morphettville, where the Firnhaber cup was located, probably from the time of the distribution of Fisher’s estate in 1906 until the sale of the house and the distribution of its contents to family members. Architect George Kingston designed the five-room, redbrick cottage for Morphett and his family in 1842. It is one of the

earliest and most elegant homes to be built in the Adelaide region during the Colonial era.

The watercolour was painted before the house was extended in 1854 with a large drawing room, with a two-thirds circular section and an arched entrance porch. In addition to the house portrait, the watercolour shows Morphett astride a glossy black horse, alongside his wife Elizabeth and their daughter. He is shown surveying his property, with his sheep and cattle grazing behind him. A group of Aboriginal people are seated in the foreground, demonstrating his amicable relations with the Indigenous people of the area.

These two extraordinary pieces of history are on display in the South Australian colonial gallery.

Anne Gray Head of Australian Art, and Robert Bell Senior Curator, Decorative Arts and Design

ACQUISITION | ARTONVIEW 37

Stephen Bird John Glover’s paint tray 2012, earthenware with pigment glaze, 23 x 35 x 31 cm, purchased 2012

Stephen Bird was born in the potteries district of Stoke-on-Trent in the United Kingdom in 1964 and arrived in Australia in 2008.

Since then, he has been a part-time lecturer in ceramics at the National Art School in Sydney.

Before arriving in Australia, Bird undertook research at the Potteries Museum in Stoke-on-Trent into the hidden meanings and political messages in mass-produced British ornamental ceramics of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Such works often used the visual techniques of trompe l’oeil to imitate other materials in satires on art, consumerism and status, often incorporating souvenirs and memorabilia from the then new phenomena of travel and the appreciation of antiquities.

Bird further subverts this convention in his John Glover’s paint tray 2012, with humour, graphic imagery, ironic reinterpretations of nationalistic slogans and a sense of the absurd, all coalescing through his craftsmanship and skill in handling the complexities

38 ARTONVIEW | ACQUISITION

of multiple ceramic glazes in one work. The work places the émigré British painter John Glover into a different context, much as the painter found himself when considering the unfamiliar landscape of his new environment. The artist himself is removed, and we are left to build a picture of him through his equipment.

The ubiquitous paint tray suggests banal domestic work, while the Toby jug used a paintbrush holder and the disembodied eyeballs on the tray jolt the viewer to a different reality, much as Glover might have intended through his work.

Bird plays with historical convention and the resulting work, entirely in glazed ceramics, exudes wit and charm through its apparent effortlessness.

Robert Bell AM Senior Curator, Decorative Arts and Design

WB Gould Cat o’ nine tails 1848, oil on canvas, 40.4 x 49.5 cm, purchased with funds from the Jarrett Bequest, 2012

Here is a cat among the fishes, looking out at us, with a sly grin on its face. It is in seventh heaven among this cornucopia of fish.

Painted by colonial artist WB Gould, it is full of character and of humour. It highlights the artist’s eye for composition and his charming, decorative and ‘primitive’ style. It is one of only three known works by Gould containing cats.

The title refers to the unpopular method of convict punishment by a whip of nine ‘claws’, as well as to nineteenth-century slang in which a cat was also known as a ‘long-tailed thief’. Gould himself was a convict and was repeatedly tried for theft and punished by ‘the cat’. These references would have been well understood by Gould’s contemporaries and particularly by his convict friends.

Gould is best known for his oil paintings of still lifes. He first arrived in Van Diemen’s Land in December 1827, after being convicted of theft and sentenced to seven years transportation.

He earned favour on board the convict ship by painting portraits

of the officers. Soon after his arrival, he was assigned as a house servant to surgeon Dr James Scott, an amateur botanist, for whom Gould painted detailed watercolour studies of indigenous plant life. He taught himself to paint in oils after arriving in Australia, although he had received some previous training as an artist in London. Gould was emancipated in 1835 but remained in Van Diemen’s Land and earned a modest living from his paintings.

The acquisition of this painting is made possible by funds generously provided by the Jarrett Bequest. The painting is in a Tasmanian Huon pine frame from the period.

Anne Gray Head of Australian Art

ACQUISITION | ARTONVIEW 39

Ron McBurnie Tobias and the angel 2008, etching, printed in black ink from one plate, plate-mark 59.2 x 89.4 cm, sheet (deckle-edged) 75.8 x 111.4 cm, Gordon Darling Australia Pacific Print Fund, 2012

Known for drawing his inspiration from art historical precedent and the whimsy and banality of every day life, Townsville-based artist Ron McBurnie is one of Australia’s most skilled and idiosyncratic contemporary printmakers.

Taken from McBurnie’s ‘romantic’ series, the etching Tobias and the angel 2008 reveals his erudite and passionate engagement with art history and explores the dramatised landscape tradition that came to prominence in Europe during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The terrifying potential of nature is captured in his sublime, tumultuous sky, rendered in dramatic contrasts of chiaroscuro. Dense layers of etched line recall the techniques of master printmakers of the past, such as Samuel Palmer and Frederick Landseer Griggs, whom McBurnie has studied closely.

Delving further into the art historical canon, McBurnie’s trio of figures—Tobias, the angel Gabriel and their canine companion— derive their motif from a seventeenth-century engraving by 40 ARTONVIEW | ACQUISITION

Dutch artist Hendrik Goudt, after the celebrated painting by Goudt’s one‑time collaborator Adam Elsheimer.

Despite this conscious layering of pictorial references, McBurnie’s work is a unique and personal elucidation of the landscape.

His biblical figures are situated alongside the present‑day Ross River in Queensland, a site he often visits with his Irish terrier Lou Lou, who is also featured in the composition. By punctuating his interpretation of the contemporary setting with art historical allusions, McBurnie deftly builds upon the rich landscape tradition that precedes him. Yet, he never appears archaic.

Rather, Tobias and the angel is a compelling display of his mastery of the etching medium and a remarkably fresh portrayal of his local Queensland landscape.

Rebecca Edwards Gordon Darling Intern, Australian Prints and Drawings

Mon-Dvaravati period Thailand

Standing Buddha 8th century, copper alloy, 48.5 x 19.8 x 19.5 cm, gift of Dr David Pfanner and Dr Ruth Pfanner, as part of 100 Works for 100 Years: a gift to the nation for the centenary of Canberra, 2013

This rare and serenely beautiful figure of the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni, is unusually large for a bronze from the early Dvaravati kingdom of central Thailand. Buddhist art flourished under the Mon-speaking rulers who dominated the region during the sixth to thirteenth centuries before they succumbed to Burmese and later to Thai powers.

Draped around the Buddha’s slim torso is a diaphanous robe, only clearly articulated in the front of the image by the elegant sweep of cloth falling from the left shoulder. The figure represents the First Sermon at Sarnath, a key event in the life of the Buddha Shakyamuni. The hands form the double vitarka mudra of explication, which symbolises the Buddha’s teaching role. Their eloquent prominence exemplifies the artistic style of the Mon-Dvaravati period. Images of the Buddha Shakyamuni were paramount in early Dvaravati art, and indeed the Buddha’s life‑narrative remains a key feature of the Theravada Buddhist sculpture of Thailand.

The art of the Dvaravati period represents a significant turning point when local Southeast Asian variations on the Indian precedents became pronounced and confident. The distinctive Dvaravati style reflects the ideal physiognomy of the Mon people who occupied the central plains of today’s Thailand: facial elements include a broad, round face, short, wide nose and full lips forming a generous, often softly smiling mouth. The eyebrows trace a softly curving bow distinct from the more stylised continuous arching brows of subsequent Thai Buddhist sculpture.

Acquired with the generous support of David and Ruth Pfanner, this eighth-century Mon-Dvaravati Standing Buddha joins the Gallery’s fine collection of Buddhist sculptures from mainland Southeast Asia on display.

Robyn Maxwell Senior Curator, Asian Art

ACQUISITION | ARTONVIEW 41

1

2

3

4

5

FACES IN VIEW

6

Big Draw

1 Roy Marchant assists children to create their own ‘rocks’ for Robert Smithson’s Rocks and mirror square II 1971 2 Children drawing in the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander galleries, 28 October 2012

42 ARTONVIEW

7

8

9

10

11

Abstract Expressionism

Toulouse-Lautrec

3 Matthew Arthur, Christine Ellis and Nathaniel Ellis in front of Jackson Pollock’s Blue poles 1952 at the event New York State of Mind, 28 November 2012

5 Barry Humphries with Toulouse-Lautrec’s Eldorado: Aristide Bruant 1892

7 Ambassador of France to Australia HE Mr Stéphane Romatet, exhibition curator Jane Kinsman, the Hon Andrew Barr MLA and Director Ron Radford AM

Melbourne Cup

4 Janet Sekavs, winner of the prize for best hat at the Melbourne Cup lunch in the Gandel Hall, 6 November 2012

6 Rhys Muldoon plays with the shadow puppets in the Family Activity Room

8 Angela Menz and Mils Achi at the opening of Toulouse-Lautrec, 13 November 2012

9 Heather Mears and Jeremy Mears at the members launch of Toulouse-Lautrec, 14 November 2012 10 Chris and Diana Hare and Jenna and Chris Breaden at the opening of Toulouse‑Lautrec, 13 November 2012

Summer Art Scholarship

11 The National Summer Art Scholars with Assistant Director Simon Elliott

ARTONVIEW 43

News from the Foundation

Gala Dinner and Weekend

Trip to the Royal Academy, London

The National Gallery of Australia Foundation hosts its annual Fundraising Gala Dinner and Weekend on Saturday 16 and Sunday 17 March. Supporters from all around Australia have attended the event since 2008, and generously contributed over $530 000 to the acquisition of six major works of art. This year includes an exclusive tour of Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge, a dinner in Gandel Hall, curator-led tours of special exhibitions and displays and brunch hosted by French Ambassador His Excellency Mr Stéphane Romatet. To take part in the weekend and support the National Gallery, contact Maryanne Voyazis on +61 2 6240 6691.

In September, the most ambitious survey exhibition of Australian art to be held outside of Australia will open at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. Foundation and Gallery members are invited to celebrate this great event with an exclusive trip to London to view the exhibition and explore London’s many cultural treasures. More information on page 24.

Masterpieces for the Nation Fund 2013 The Masterpieces for the Nation Fund has assisted with the acquisition of eleven significant works of art since 2003. The fund is open to donors at all giving levels and provides an opportunity for people to impact positively on the Gallery’s ability to acquire masterpieces for the national art collection. For more, see page 28.

Rupert Myer AM and Annabel Myer and Jay Griffin and Richard Griffin AM at last year’s Foundation Fundraising Gala Dinner and Weekend, 17 March 2012.

44 ARTONVIEW

Bequest Circle The Bequest Circle welcomes new members Ann Kerrison, Paul Brand and Keith Bennett, Joan Miskin and Barry Miskin and Ingrid Mitchell. The Bequest Circle recognises, in their lifetime, supporters who have made a bequest. For more information, contact Liz Wilson on (02) 6240 6469 or liz.wilson@nga.gov.au.

The support of donors to the fundraising initiatives of the Foundation is greatly appreciated. To get involved, contact Maryanne Voyazis on (02) 6240 6691 or foundation@nga.gov.au.

Curatorial assistant Jacqueline Chlanda and Indigenous curator Kelli Cole with Emeritus Professor Ian Falconer AO and Elinor Swan at the Masterpieces for the Nation Fund 2012 Thank You event, 27 September 2012.

Creative partnerships

Win a Renault Megane Hatch The Gallery has partnered with Rolfe Renault Canberra to offer visitors to the Gallery’s summer blockbuster Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge the chance to win a brand new 2013 Renault Megane Hatch, including all on-road costs. Total prize value is $28 880.

Toulouse-Lautrec traces the short but brilliant career of one of the brightest stars of modern art history. Toulouse-Lautrec had a profound impact on the evolution of art in the twentieth century, and the Gallery’s retrospective presents paintings, posters, prints and drawings from his earliest works to his extraordinary depictions of the Paris social scene, dance halls, cafe-concerts, brothels and theatres.

He was an acute observer and a brilliant draughtsman, and he captured the character of his subjects with undeniable authority and skill. Toulouse-Lautrec is only on until 2 April 2013 and the competition for the Renault Megane Hatch closes at the beginning of the last session on that day.

Don’t miss out on this remarkable exhibition or your chance to win a brand new car. Buy a ticket to Toulouse-Lautrec today and opt in to go into this exciting prize draw.

Entry to the competition is open to anyone 18 years old or over who purchases a ticket to Toulouse-Lautrec (only one entry per person). All entrants must agree to the terms and conditions of the competition to be eligible to win. Visit nga.gov.au/Toulouse for more information on the exhibition, prize and terms and conditions.

The winner will be drawn at random by the National Gallery of Australia at 3.00 pm on Monday 15 April 2013 and will be notified within two working days. The winner’s name will be published on the Gallery’s website within thirty days of the draw and in the May edition of the Gallery’s online newsletter Artonline.

If you are interested in creating ties with the Australian community through the arts, contact Nicole Short, +61 2 6240 6781 or nicole.short@nga.gov.au, or Eleanor Kirkham, +61 2 6240 6740 or eleanor.kirkham@nga.gov.au.

Rolfe Renault’s customised Toulouse-Lautrec Megane Hatch at the entrance to the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, December 2012.

ARTONVIEW 45

Thank you …

Exhibitions, programs and acquisitions at the National Gallery of Australia are realised through the generous support of our partners and donors. The National Gallery of Australia would like to thank the following organisations and people:

Grants American Friends of the National Gallery of Australia, Inc, New York, made possible with the assistance of: Kenneth Tyler AO and Marabeth Cohen‑Tyler Wolfensohn Family Foundation The Aranday Foundation Gordon Darling Foundation The Lidia Perin Foundation National Gallery of Australia Council Exhibitions Fund National Gallery of Australia Foundation Board Publishing Fund Terra Foundation for American Art Thyne Reid Foundation Yulgilbar Foundation

Australian Government Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, through: Council on Australian and Latin American Relations International Cultural Visits Program Department of Regional Australia, Local Government, Arts and Sport, through: The National Collecting Institutions Touring and Outreach Program, an Australian Government program aiming to improve access to the national collections for all Australians Visions of Australia, an Australian Government program supporting touring exhibitions by providing funding assistance for the development and touring of Australian cultural material across Australia, and through Art Indemnity Australia Australia Council for the Arts Department of Health and Ageing through the Dementia Community Grants Program Queensland Indigenous Arts Marketing and Export Agency

46 ARTONVIEW

State and territory governments Queensland Government, through Arts Queensland New South Wales Government, through Arts NSW Northern Territory Government, through Arts NT Western Australian Government, through the Department of Culture and the Arts

Corporate partners ActewAGL Aesop AGB Events Australian Broadcasting Commission ACT Government, through Australian Capital Tourism Brassey Hotel of Canberra Canberra Airport The Canberra Times Clayton Utz Coopers Brewery Eckersley’s Art & Craft Flash Photobition Forrest Hotel and Apartments Hyatt Hotel Canberra Maddocks Moët Hennessy Australia Molonglo Group National Australia Bank Nine Network Australia Novotel Canberra Qantas Rolfe Motors The Sydney Morning Herald WIN Television

Donations Includes donations received from 27 October 2012 to 25 January 2013 Micky Allan Maggie Shaw and James Armstrong Eric Coote and Evarne Coote L Gordon Darling AC, CMG, and Marilyn Darling AC Robert Fielding Janina Green

Melinda Harper Hermitage Old Girls’ Archive Frances Kofod and Peter Seidel, executors of the estate of Paddy Bedford John Loane Ron McBurnie Helena Miksevicius The estate of Mary Norrie and Angus Norrie Rosslynd Piggott Silk Cut Foundation Fern Smith and Peregrine Smith Heather Swann Mary Szarka Margaret Tuckson Gretchen Wheen Wilbow Group

100 Works for 100 Years Ken Baxter and Annabel Baxter Neilma Gantner Professor Brian O’Keeffe AO John Schaeffer AO Ezekiel Solomon AM Kaely Woods and Mike Woods

National Gallery of Australia Council Exhibitions Fund John Calvert-Jones AM Jeanne Pratt AC

National Gallery of Australia Foundation Board Publishing Fund Penelope Seidler AM

Members Acquisition Fund 2010–11 Murrelia Wheatley

Members Acquisition Fund 2012–13 Lenore Adamson Ken Alexander Beverley A Allen Robin Amm AM The Hon Dr Michael Armitage and Susan Armitage Jeanne Arthur Michelle Atkinson John Baker

Lesley Barker Prof Martin Bennett Beverley Birtles Michelle Black, Creations Jewellers Robert Blacklow Beryl Blaseotto Harry Brackstone and Wendy Brackstone Cheryl Bridge Sam Bullen Jill Burke Ron Burns and Gail Burns Margaret Burt David Campbell Deb Carroll and Jim Carroll Alan Cassel Maureen Chan Dr Ian Clark and Dr Margaret Clark Natalie Cooke Ann Steve and Heather Cork Kerry-Anne Cousins Merrilyn Crawford Georgia Croker Jean Cruickshank Charles Curran AC and Eva Curran Mary Curtis and Richard Mann Shannon Cuthbertson Henry Dalrymple Ruth Daylight-Baker and Nirvana Daylight-Baker Robyn Dean Jill Dominguez and Samuel Dominguez Linnea Donnelly Dr Lee MacCormick Edwards and Michael Crane Dr Murray Elliott AO and Gillian Elliott Gay Emmerson Prof Ian Falconer and Mary Falconer Peter Flanagan and Cherie Flanagan J Fuller Peter Somerville and Juanita Gabriel Neilma Gantner Roy Garwood Margaret Gibson and Glenn Gibson Marya Glyn-Daniel June Gordon Lyn Gorman

Gillian Gould Elizabeth J Guthrie Dr Kate Guy and Bill Guy Ricardo Hafon and Edna Hafon Kerri Hall and Christopher Baker John Harrison and Danielle Kluth Ann Healey Shirley Hemmings Anthony Hill and Maureen Hill Dr Marian Hill Krystina Hoylland Gordon Hutchinson and Patricia Hutchinson Claudia Hyles Denise James Dr Joe Johnson CSC AAM and Madeleine Johnson Elaine Johnston Roma Blamey Susan Jones Penelope Jurkiewicz WG Keighley Margaret Kellond Arthur Kenyon AM and Helen Kenyon Angus Kirkwood Betty Irene Konta Charmaine Lageman Ruth Lathlean Dr Clara Elizabeth Lawson and Dr Robert Digley Christopher Lee Faye Lee Thomas Leffers and Corrie Leffers Chev William MacCallum Judith MacIntyre Alan Mallory Neil Mann Svetlana Manns Dr Bruce Marshall AM and Robin Coombes Margaret Mashford Douglas John and Fleur McAlister Patricia McCullough Dr Stephen McNamara Tina Merriman Paul Minogue and Mandy Minogue Esther Missingham Cathi Moore and Brendan Cox Jean Moran Judah Moses

Janet Moyle Dr Angus Muir Claude Neumann Kerry O’Brien Dr Milton Osborne Rita Parker and Michael Parker Kim Paterson RJ Pearce and PR Pearce Ron Price and Fay Price Anne Prins LA Riley Alan Rose AO and Helen Rose Raoul Salpeter and Roslyn Salpeter Mark Sampson and Ruth Sampson Claire Scott The Sharp Family Rosamond Shepherd Deanna Simpson and Murray Simpson Dr Mike Slee and Dr Judy Slee Roy Smalley OAM and Ruth Smalley Jennifer Smith Margaret Smither Phyllis Somerville Carolyn Spittle and Murray Spittle David Stanley and Anne Stanley Robert Swift and Lynette Swift Lady Elizabeth Synnot Jacqueline Thompson Helen Topor and Dr Peter Fullagar Kenneth Tyler AO and Marabeth Cohen-Tyler Elizabeth Upton Niek Van Vucht and Jenny Van Vucht Morna Vellacott Dr Hilary Warren Joyce Wheatley and Norman Wheatley Murrelia Wheatley Barbara White and Brian White Jean Williams and Alex Williams Andrew Williamson Bruce Wilson and Karen Wilson Lynette Wilson Robine Wilson and the late Donald Wilson Gwen Wilton and 45 donors who wish to remain anonymous

Masterpieces for the Nation Fund 2012 Belinda Barrett Marshall Donoghoe Sara Kelly Claudette Taylor in memory of Dylan and 3 donors who wish to remain anonymous

Japanese Art Fund Andrew Gwinnett and Hiroko Gwinnett

Decorative Arts and Design Fund Sandy Benjamin OAM and Phillip Benjamin Emeritus Professor Barbara Van Ernst AM

South Australian Contemporary Art Fund Macquarie Group Foundation Susan Armitage

For more information about developing creative partnerships with the National Gallery of Australia, contact: Nicole Short on +61 2 6240 6781 or nicole.short@nga.gov.au For more information about making a donation, contact: Maryanne Voyazis on +61 2 6240 6691 or maryanne.voyazis@nga.gov.au

ARTONVIEW 47

Members news

Three international blockbusters

Royal Academy

As this is Canberra’s centenary year, the Gallery is celebrating with three blockbuster exhibitions. Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge is currently on display until 2 April; Turner from the Tate: The Making of a Master, an exhibition from the Tate’s unsurpassed collection of Turners, opens 1 June; and the 2013 summer blockbuster, although yet to be announced, will surely surprise.

This year, the National Gallery of Australia has partnered with the Royal Academy of Arts in London on Australia, the largest survey of our nation’s art to be held outside Australia. To celebrate, we invite members to join us on a trip to London as ambassadors of Australia and to experience the many cultural fruits of the city. See page 24 for more on this exciting endeavour.

It is during these major exhibitions that being a member is most beneficial, with priority exhibition entry and discounts on exhibition tickets, in the NGA Shop and on food. These exhibitions also mean more special events exclusive to members.

Members Acquisition Fund 2012–13

Over the summer months, members enjoyed some wonderful events associated with Toulouse-Lautrec, including the thoroughly entertaining children’s Christmas performance, the decadent night with the green fairy and an informative and delightful curator’s dinner. To participate in the various programs associated with exhibitions at the Gallery, including the upcoming Turner from the Tate, book now at nga.gov.au/Members or on (02) 6240 6528.

Poncho Circus entertains the audience at the members night for Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris and the Moulin Rouge, 14 December 2012.

48 ARTONVIEW

The Members Acquisition Fund 2012–13 continues, with many members already generously contributing to the acquisition of Toulouse-Lautrec’s vibrant lithograph Divan Japonais 1893. This work is currently on display in the exhibition Toulouse-Lautrec and will become a significant addition to the national art collection.

As a member, you can play your part in the life of the National Gallery and enjoy the many benefits this brings to you and the community. To become a member, go to nga.gov.au/Members or free call 1800 020 068.

Gallery members Suzie Paul, Sylvia Jordan and friend, 14 December 2012.

IT’S ABOUT AUSTRALIA’S ARTISTS Now Australia’s artists can see the full value of their work, especially when it is resold. The resale royalty scheme is all about making sure that the people who created the work get their fair share of the benefit.

Since the scheme was launched in 2010 we’ve been pleased by the number of eligible resales reported.

Many art dealers, galleries and auction houses have provided sales The Australian Government has appointed Copyright Agency to manage the resale royalty scheme.

information, which means we’ve been able to pay royalties to artists.

If you’re a dealer, gallery or auction house and are unsure about legal obligations under the scheme, or you need help reporting resales, please contact Judy Grady. If you’re an artist and would like to know more about the scheme, please contact Tristan Chant. 1800 066 844 or resale@copyright.com.au.

Nicholas Harding and his work Pandanus landscape 2012 (170 x 194cm).

Photograph by Richard Birch.

A World of Travel

Australia’s finest collection of cultural and special interest tours

Summer Festivals of America with Mary Jo Capps, CEO of Musica Viva CArMEl – MEnlO – SAntA FE – ASpEn 22 July–5 August 2013 (15 days) Enjoy four of America’s leading summer cultural events: the Carmel Bach Festival, Music@Menlo, Aspen Music Festival and the Santa Fe Opera.

OPERA • BALLET • MUSIC • ART • RAIL • GARDENS

A Taste of Sri Lanka

Art and Music Cruise

Bali: Gardens in Paradise

with paul van reyk CulturAl triAnglE – highlAndS – gAllE – COlOMbO 2–17 September 2013

AMStErdAM tO ZuriCh On AMAdEuS prinCESS 14–28 September 2013

with Sandra pratten SAnur – ubud September 2013

From the Golden Age of Dutch painting to the collections of Switzerland, this unique cruise/tour along the Rhine River will provide a panorama of European art, history, music and landscapes.

During a week in Bali, discover a wonderful selection of gardens, including royal water gardens and temples, traditional domestic compounds and modern private gardens, botanic gardens and nurseries.

Discover the incredible depth of flavours, smells, history and culture Sri Lanka has to offer, visiting World Heritage listed sites, bustling cities, the highlands and a National Park plus cooking demonstrations.

For detailed information visit www.renaissancetours.com.au, call 1300 727 095 or contact your travel agent

2013 ARCHIBALD PRIZE 23 MARCH – 2 JUNE

In Canberra?

Tune to your local radio station

air on

on

go e th

online

Alex Sloan Adam Shirley Greg Bayliss Graham Williams Melanie Tait Ross Solly

Genevieve Jacobs

Tim Gavel

Your world like you’ve never seen it An exhibition of unique works that document a new art movement emerging from the Western Desert community of Warakurna Tjukurrpa ngaparrku-ngaparrku nintira nyuntulu-yan kulira nintirrinytjaku.

We are sharing our stories with you so that you can learn about them.

FREE | ON SHOW UNTIL 3 NOVEMBER 2013 NATIONAL MUSEUM OF AUSTRALIA, CANBERRA

www.nma.gov.au Free entry | Open 9 am – 5 pm daily (closed Christmas Day) Acton Peninsula Canberra | Freecall 1800 026 132 Donations (tax deductible) are welcome, visit www.nma.gov.au/support_us The National Museum of Australia is an Australian Government Agency Helicopter Ride with Brooksy to See My Father’s Ngurra (Country), 2011, by Ken Shepherd, one of a new collection of artworks by Warakurna Artists, donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Wayne and Vicki McGeoch, National Museum of Australia

Introducing The Canberra Times iPad app.

It brings Canberra’s best journalism to your fingertips. Whenever, wherever.

Download it now before you take off.

It’s free for a limited time.

Data download charges apply.

iPad is a trademark of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries. App Store is a service mark of Apple I nc.

Hotel Hotel A place for people people • Opening soon hotel-hotel. com.au Hotel Hotel NewActon Nishi, 25 Edinburgh Ave Canberra

For reservation or conferencing enquiries, please call 02 6287 6287 or email — hello@hotel-hotel.com.au

AUTUMN DEMONSTRATOR

CLEARANCE ROLFE RENAULT IS OFFERING SIGNIFICANT CAN NT SAVINGS ACROSS THE RENAULT RANGE GE Visit us today or go online - www.rolferenault.com.au

ROLFE RENAULT 152 MELROSE DRIVE, PHILLIP ACT 2606 PH: (02) 6282 8000 15 JOSEPHSON STREET, BELCONNEN ACT 2617 PH: (02) 6253 5551

rolferenault.com.au

East Hotel, Canberra’s highly anticipated four and a half star contemporary design and lifestyle hotel is now open. With its focus on providing a memorable Canberra experience and its premium location just minutes from the National Gallery of Australia, between the fashionable retail and restaurant hubs of Manuka and Kingston, East Hotel ups the ante for local guests and visitors to the nation’s capital.

East Hotel provides a contemporary, cool and vibrant option for visitors to Canberra, whether overnighters, business guests, long stay guests or families. The six-story hotel has 140 rooms in various studio and apartment-style combinations, recognizing the challenges families can face with hotel accommodation by providing specially designated suites, cleverly designed in a modular, fun way specifically to cater for both adults and kids. The hotel has standalone dining and bar facilities, with Ox Eatery and it’s associated Bar and Delicatessen sure to become an instant classic.

East Hotel’s business facilities are state-of-the-art with modern and professional conference rooms, boardrooms and an all-day meeting lounge, complete with air hockey table, to foster the creative environment that leads to the success of any meeting. The facilities have the flexibility to fit perfectly to most business requirements with a distinctively edgy East Hotel touch.

69 Canberra Avenue, Kingston ACT 2604 | +61 2 6295 6925 | easthotel.com.au

JOIN OTHER CREATIVES IN OUR SOCIAL SPACE

art monthly AUSTRALIA

celebrating 25 years in 2012 Don’t miss an issue!

ART MONTHLY

ART MONTHLY A U S T R A L II A A

A U S T R A L I A

sultry sultry summer summer issue issue 246 246

D e cDeem e rb e2r0 2 10 1 1t 1 o tFoe bFreubarruya r2y0 2 10 21 2 c ebm

245 NOVEMBER 2011

ART MONTHLY

A U S T R A L I A

237 March 2011

subscribe . advertise . trade www.artmonthly.org.au

Washington, Chicago, Pennsylvania, New York Academy Travel’s North East USA tour surveys American history and culture from Thomas Jefferson’s Monticello to the latest contemporary art in New York. Our unique itinerary features a special focus on the work of Frank Lloyd Wright, America’s greatest architect. In Chicago we visit his early domestic work, including Robie House. In New York we check out his last project, the swirling Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum on Fifth Avenue. But the highlight is Fallingwater, deep in rural Pennsylvania, described by the Smithsonian Institute as one of ‘28 places to visit before you die’.

The tour also includes a full week in New York, with walking tours, a private viewing of the Museum of Modern Art, fine dining, orchestral concerts, Broadway and the Metropolitan Opera. Well located four and five star hotels throughout. Maximum group size is 20 and both tour dates now have only a handful of places remaining.

The North East USA Dates: May 5-22, 2013 or October 10-27, 2013 Tour leader: Stuart Barrie (May), Robert Veel (October) Cost: $9,640, twin share Itinerary: Washington (4 nights), Chicago (4 nights), rural Pennsylvania (2 nights), Gettysburg (1 night), New York (7 nights)

Full details www.academytravel.com.au

Pittsburgh

Itineraries are planned to provide a range of experiences in an unhurried way, accommodation is carefully selected and our expert tour leaders give background talks and lead site visits, transforming your travels into a journey of discovery and understanding.

Full year catalogue now available! Contact us for your copy and to receive regular tour updates.

Full itinerary details available on our website.

Canada

Chicago

Academy Travel is a leading Australian provider of cultural journeys to Europe, Asia, the Middle East and the Americas.

Each year we offer around 35 tours exploring the history, art, archaeology and music of some of the world’s most alluring destinations.

New York Gettysburgh Washington

Charlottesville

USA

tailored small group Journeys

› Expert tour leaders › Maximum 20 in a group › Carefully planned itineraries Level 1, 341 George St Sydney NSW 2000 Phone: + 61 2 9235 0023 or 1800 639 699 (outside Sydney) Fax: + 61 2 9235 0123 Email: info@academytravel.com.au Web: www.academytravel.com.au

ONE CITY,

ONE CENTURY,

ONE HUGE CM1212312/01

celebration

Happy birthday Canberra – it’s an honour to celebrate with you.

It’s a very exciting time for our capital and as the Principal Partner, we’re committed to making the Centenary of Canberra a celebration to remember.

We’re proud to call Canberra home - we’ve been here since the beginning and we’ll be here into the next century and beyond.

We look forward to commemorating this milestone with you during the exciting year-long calendar of events.

Let’s celebrate the good times together.

PROUD PRINCIPAL

PARTNER ActewAGL Retail ABN 46 221 314 841.

actewagl.com.au

C•A• N•B•E•R•R•A

14 December 2012 – 2 April 2013 National Gallery of Australia

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec La Goulue at the Moulin Rouge (La Goulue entrant au Moulin-Rouge) 1891-92 oil on cardboard 79.4 x 59.0 cm The Museum of Modern Art, New York Gift of Mrs David M. Levy

Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris & the Moulin Rouge is on display at the National Gallery of Australia from 14 December 2012 until 2 April 2013. This is the first major retrospective in Australia of the art of Henri de Toulouse Lautrec and will include more than 100 paintings, posters, prints and drawings. Toulouse-Lautrec: Paris & the Moulin Rouge will present spectacular images of Parisian café society, the high and low life of Bohemian Paris and famous dance halls such as the Moulin-Rouge.

NatioNal gallery accommodatioN package Package Includes: • Accommodation in Heritage room for two guests.

• Two tickets to the Toulouse-Lautrec exhibition at the National Gallery of Australia.

• Full buffet breakfast for two.

• Complimentary bottle of bubbly.

• Free parking and daily newspaper.

The Brassey of Canberra Belmore Gardens and Macquarie Street, Barton ACT 2600 Phone: 02 6273 3766 Email: info@brassey.net.au

Toll Free Telephone Bookings 1800 659 191 www.Brassey.neT.au

Canberran Owned and Operated

Canberra’s Only Heritage bOu t ique HO t e l (es t. 192 7 )

important fine art auction melbourne • april 2013

Arthur Streeton Settler'S CAmp, 1888 • Sold May 2012 for $2,520,000 (inc. buyer's premium) • highest price achieved at auction in Australia during 2012

InVItAtIon to ConSIGn Deutscher and Hackett are now seeking consignments of significant works of art for inclusion in our forthcoming April auction

For a confidential and obligation free appraisal please contact: Sydney • 02 9287 0600

info@deutscherandhackett.com • www.deutscherandhackett.com

WEEKDAYS 5.30AM

henri de toulouse-lautrec Place Pigalle 1894, brush, crayon and spatter colour lithograph mounted on canvas, 61.1 x 80 cm, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, purchased 1945.

cultural getaway from

189

$

*

per night includes breakfast

Enjoy overnight accommodation, a full buffet breakfast for two at One Restaurant and Bar and two tickets to the National Gallery of Australia’s Toulouse-Lautrec exhibition on show from 14 December 2012.

novotel canberra Official accommodation partner of the NGA’s Toulouse-Lautrec 65 Northbourne Avenue, Canberra. Tel. 02 6245 5000

To book visit novotelcanberra.com.au Designed for natural living *Valid for stays at Novotel Canberra only between 14 December 2012 and 2 April 2013 inclusive. Bookings are payable at time of reservation and are non-exchangeable, non-refundable and non-transferable. All rates are per night for single, twin or double occupancy in a standard room including complimentary breakfast for up to 2 people. Rates are subject to change and are based on a limited allocation of rooms and subject to availability. Blackout dates may apply. Minimum length of stay may apply. Includes 2 x general untimed admission tickets per stay to the ‘Toulouse-Lautrec’ exhibition at the National Gallery of Australia. Accor Advantage Plus members receive their 10% discount and Le Club Accorhotels members will earn points on each stay booked on the ‘Cultural Getaway’ package.

Like us on facbook & post to our timeline

Follow us on twitter @forresthotel

Making connections across Australia and beyond For over 125 years Maddocks lawyers have helped clients understand the law, negotiate agreements and resolve disputes.

Celebrating 1 year in Canberra.

Maddocks law firm is the proud legal partner of the National Gallery of Australia and is deeply committed to supporting arts in Australia.

Canberra | Sydney | Melbourne www.maddocks.com.au

TU R NE R

N AT I O N A L G A L L E RY O F A U S T R A L I A , C A N B E R R A

FROM THE TATE

THE MAKING OF A MASTER

AUTUMN 2013 | 73

PRESENTING PARTNERS

MAJOR PARTNERS

ORGANISED BY

SUPPORTING PARTNER

JMW Turner Regulus 1828 (detail), reworked 1837, Tate, London, accepted by the nation as part of the Turner Bequest, 1856. Photograph © Tate, 2013

AUTUMN 2013 | 73