National Gallery of Australia
ARTONVIEW SPRING 2019 | 99 National Gallery of Australia
Rehang of International galleries
LICHTENSTEIN TO WARHOL CONTEMPORARY WORLDS: INDONESIA KNOW MY NAME TEEN COUNCIL ASIAN ART PLUS THE LATEST NEWS, ACQUISTIONS AND MORE
Spring 99 | 2019
now consigning AUCTION • 27 NOVEMBER 2019 • MElBOURNE important australian + international fine art for appraisals please contact MeLBOurne • 03 9865 6333 SyDney • 02 9287 0600 info@deutscherandhackett.com www.deutscherandhackett.com
DEL KATHRYN BARTON From her nest in the Holm-Oak tree the nightingale heard him, 2011 SOLD: $280,600 (inc. BP) Melbourne, June 2018 © Del Kathryn Barton
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Salvador Dalí Lobster telephone 1936, painted plaster, telephone. National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, purchased 1994. © Salvador Dalí. Fundació Gala-Salvador Dalí/Copyright Agency
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ARTONVIEW 99 SPRING 2019
CONTENTS
The National Gallery of Australia acknowledges and pays its respect to the traditional custodians of the Canberra region, the Ngunnawal and Ngambri peoples and their Elders past and present.
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Artonview may contain names and images of deceased Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Editor Eric Meredith Guest contributors Philip Bacon, gallerist and philanthropist Alia Swastika, curator and writer Contributors Celeste Aldahn, Tim Fairfax Teen Coordinator Carol Cains, Senior Curator, Asian Art David Greenhalgh, Curatorial Assistant, Kenneth Tyler Collection Bianca Hill, Assistant Curator, Australian Art Jane Kinsman, Head of International Art Shane Nelson, Indigenous Program Producer Kirsti Partridge, Governance and Reporting Manager Advertising enquiries ArtonviewAdvertising@nga.gov.au Enquiries artonview.editor@nga.gov.au nga.gov.au/artonview © National Galley of Australia 2019 PO Box 1150, Canberra ACT 2601, Australia +61 (0)2 6240 6411 | nga.gov.au
DIRECTOR’S WORD Nick Mitzevich
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IN BRIEF
10 EXHIBITION LISTING 11
NEW BOOKS
12 A SPRING CANVAS 14
NEW INITIATIVES KNOW MY NAME: 18 ARTISTS TO START THE CONVERSATION With the launch of the Know My Name campaign, we thought to start the conversation with eighteen artists in the collection
24 TEEN TAKEOVER Celeste Aldahn introduces the National Gallery’s new teen programming
28 MAJOR DONOR TIM FAIRFAX Philip Bacon talks to Tim Fairfax AC about his time on the Council and his generous support of acquisitions and programs, particularly art education
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MAJOR PARTNERSHIP WESFARMERS ARTS Shane Nelson reflects on the success of the National Gallery’s ten-year partnership with Wesfarmers Arts and reveals some of what’s coming next
34 CURRENT EXHIBITION LICHTENSTEIN TO WARHOL: THE KENNETH TYLER COLLECTION Published quarterly. Copyright of works of art is held by the artists or their estates. Every effort has been made to identify copyright holders but omissions may occur. Views expressed by writers are not necessarily those of the National Gallery of Australia. ISSN 1323-4552 ISSN 2208-6218 (Online) Designed by Kirsty Morrison Printed by Adams Print, on FSC certified paper using vegetable-based inks, FSC-C110099
Jane Kinsman highlights the exploits of master printer Ken Tyler’s on show in this new exhibition from 7 September
40 PHOTOS FROM THE KENNETH TYLER ARCHIVE David Greenhalgh picks out a few candid photographs from the Gallery’s extensive Kenneth Tyler photographic archive
44 CURRENT MAJOR EXHIBITION CONTEMPORARY WORLDS: INDONESIA Alia Swastika focuses on some of the women artists in Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia who have progressed feminist thinking in Indonesia
48 COLLECTION DISPLAYS ASIAN ART ON THE MOVE Carol Cains previews the new Asian art galleries, opening early November
54 URS FISCHER’S FRANCESCO Cover: David Hockney pressing colour pulp into a mould for experimental paper-pulp work (never published and destroyed) during the Paper pools series, Tyler Workshop, Bedford Village, New York, 1978. Photo: Lindsay Green Opposite: Tutini created in 1984 by Tiwi artists Boniface Alimankinni, Kevin Mukwakinni, Bede Tungutalum and Mickey Geranium Warlapinni and acquired for the national collection through the Founding Donors’ Fund 1984.
Bianca Hill highlights the imminent return of Swiss artist Urs Fischer’s Francesco
56 MAJOR LOAN SARAH LUCAS Bianca Hill takes a frank look at Sarah Lucas’s Deep Cream Maradona, on loan for Bodies of Art
58 NEW ACQUISITIONS Uji ‘Hahan’ Handoko Eko Saputro and Adi ‘Uma Gumma’ Kusuma, Indonesian textiles, Howard Taylor, Benjamin Armstrong ARTONVIEW 99 SPRING 2019
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DIRECTOR’S WORD
Creativity and learning through art is central to our vision at the
taking place over the past half a century. They are a select few of about
National Gallery of Australia. Earlier this year, as part of our new
60 000 photographs, which are part a huge archival collection that also
learning strategy, we opened the Tim Fairfax Learning Gallery on Level
includes hundreds of hours of film, sketchbooks, workshop records,
2 with Body Language, an exhibition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait
correspondence and various publications from Tyler’s personal library.
Islander art from the national collection exploring visual language and
in 2002 thanks to Ken’s generosity (which also supports a dedicated
designed art-making and learning space. Over the past few months,
exhibition program, emerging curatorial staff and research and digital
we have transformed the building’s original theatre into a unique place
access to the collection online at nga.gov.au/tyler). The collection also
for school students, children, families and visitors of all ages and abilities
positions the National Gallery as an important study centre for modern
to creatively engage with the national collection.
printmaking, as it encapsulates an art historical era that witnessed a
Inspired by the geometry of Col Madigan’s iconic architecture, the studio will expand the opportunities for making and responding
rebirth in printmaking in which Tyler played a unique role. Now we’re in spring, Monet: Impression Sunrise has closed, and
to the ideas of artists. Importantly, art making will not be contained
we are focusing much of our attention on the national collection and
by the studio, as we have also launched the Mobile Studio, which
thinking about how it takes its next step. We’re changing displays,
enables creative responses in the galleries, right in front of works of art.
first, of our Asian art in November (see pages 46–51) and then of our
Additionally, the studio features a significant upgrade to our audio-visual
Australian art in December. Art is a mirror not just of where we come
capabilities, which will enable an expansion of our digital excursions for
from but where we are heading, so our collection and how we display
schools, broadening the opportunities for all Australian school students
it should reflect this, reflect our ambitions and our history and how we
to engage with the national collection.
can move ahead as a passionate, tolerant, compassionate and outwardly
These programs, onsite and online, are made possible through the
focused country. One of the most urgent issues for us is how we are
generosity of our Education Patron Tim Fairfax AC, an extraordinary
going to elevate the work of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders,
supporter of the Gallery’s learning and education programs,
to decolonise that space. And the new Australian hang will do this to
including our new teen initiatives. Celeste Aldahn, our Tim Fairfax
some extent. It’s a process though, and one we don’t take lightly.
Teen Coordinator, shares more on the teen takeover on pages 24–7.
We are now celebrating a ten-year partnership with Wesfarmers
Tim was a member of our Council until recently and has now joined
Arts in this area. With their support, we were able to initiate our
our Foundation Board. Fellow member of the board Philip Bacon
leadership and fellowship programs in 2009, which have supported the
AM (incidentally named ‘Leading Philanthropist’ at the Australian
development and growth of Indigenous arts workers in the industry for
Philanthropy Awards this year) spoke to Tim in July about his support of
a decade now. Both the Gallery and Wesfarmers are very proud of these
our learning initiatives and his time on our Council. See pages 28–30.
programs and what they’ve achieved. The partnership has changed over
Coming up, we have Lichtenstein to Warhol: The Kenneth Tyler
the years, too, with Wesfarmers Arts supporting many other Indigenous-
Collection opening on 7 September. In November last year, it was my
related programs, and we’re currently working on an exhibition
pleasure to interview Ken Tyler AO at the Gallery. Ken is a master printer
together. Shane Nelson, our Indigenous Program Producer, reveals more
and major benefactor to the Gallery and was an extraordinary figure in
on pages 31–3.
the printmaking renaissance in United States in the twentieth century.
Our exhibition Bodies of Art: Human Form from the National
We livestreamed the conversation, and it was fascinating to learn how
Collection has also evolved again, with some works coming in and other
he engaged key artists—artists everyone would be familiar with—to bring
going on loan or being rested. A notable addition is Sarah Lucas’s huge
the very best qualities of their practice to the fore in print. Jane Kinsman,
contemporary sculpture Deep Cream Maradona 2015 (see pages 54–5).
Head of International Art, highlights the exhibition on pages 32–7.
It is an undeniably compelling work, largely because it interrupts what
Lichtenstein to Warhol showcases works by artists such as Helen
we have come to expect, and accept, of the tradition of the reclining
Frankenthaler, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, Joan Mitchell, Andy
nude. It makes an intriguing counterpoint to Jeff Koon’s Balloon Venus
Warhol, Frank Stella, David Hockney and more alongside candid
Dolni Vestonice (Yellow) 2013–17 in the exhibition.
photographs that help to explain the printmaking processes and show
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This important archival collection was acquired by the Gallery
identity. It will soon be joined by the Tim Fairfax Studio, a purpose-
Urs Fischer’s candle sculpture Francesco 2017 will also be coming
how the artists engaged with them. These photographs come from
back. Acquired for the collection late last year and burning down over
Ken’s desire to document the radical developments in printmaking
five months from March, this work is currently being recast ready to
DIRECTOR’S WORD
delight audiences anew over summer. If you missed it last time, this is another chance. Summer will also be bringing people from around the globe to see Matisse Picasso, an exhibition that tells the story of one of the great rivalries of art history, a rivalry that has benefited generations of artists and art lovers by bringing the best out of Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso. Finally, I encourage you all to keep an eye on our website, as we have many irons in the fire—new and exciting exhibitions and displays, acquisitions for the collection, fundraising campaigns and public and education programs—that will be announced in coming months. We will also be sharing more about the Know My Name campaign we launched earlier in the year and the related exhibition we are preparing for next year. Nick Mitzevich
National Gallery Director Nick Mitzevich and curatorial staff with visiting Indonesian artists whose works are on display in Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia, plus the Indonesian Ambassador to Australia His Excellency Kristiarto Legowo and his wife Caecilia Legowo, Exhibition Patron Ezekiel Solomon and Australian Ambassador to Indonesia Gary Quinlan AO, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 22 June 2019.
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IN BRIEF Matisse Picasso 13 December 2019 to 13 April 2020 The rivalry between Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso is one of the most significant stories of modern art, and it is this story that the National Gallery will tell this summer in its major exhibition Matisse Picasso. Drawn from some forty important international collections, Matisse Picasso shows how these two pioneers of modern art mined each other’s work to enhance their own and shared the need to confront the challenges set by the paintings of Paul Cézanne. In the early twentieth century, Picasso became a colossus of modern art, revered and emulated by many of the younger generation of avant-garde artists who had initially been inspired by Matisse and Fauvism. He explored seemingly endless stylistic possibilities for art, leaving few paths uncharted. Others could only follow suit, with the exception of Matisse. Matisse Picasso will trace the paths these two artists took over decades as they responded to each other. It will begin with the young Picasso settling in Paris, where he was determined to make a name for himself. Taking radical steps towards Cubism, he confronted the older Matisse, who was then renowned as the radical leader of the Fauves. Despite Picasso’s competitive bravado and resistance, Matisse’s creativity also enticed, disturbed and ruffled him. In the end, when Matisse was at his most dynamic, Picasso was also, such was the power of their rivalry and respect for one another. No one was more watchful of Matisse’s art than Picasso and vice versa. Both explored pictorial issues in unique ways, but always remained on guard, acknowledging and challenging each other through their creative output.
Left, from top: Henri Matisse Reclining odalisque 1926, oil on canvas. Metropolitan Museum, New York, bequest of Miss Adelaide Milton de Groot (1876–1967), 1967. © Succession H Matisse/Copyright Agency; Pablo Picasso La lecture 1932, oil on canvas, Musée Picasso, Paris. © Succession Picasso/Copyright Agency. Photo © RMN-Grand Palais (Musée national Picasso-Paris) / Mathieu Rabeau
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IN BRIEF
Hugh Ramsay 30 November 2019 to mid March 2020 Hugh Ramsay brings together works from public and private collections around Australia to celebrate a remarkable talent who has often been referred to as ‘an artist’s artist’ and who deserves to be better known more widely in this country and internationally. Showing extraordinary passion for the visual arts early on, Hugh Ramsay entered the National Gallery School in Melbourne at the tender age of sixteen, his fellow students nicknaming him ‘Young Hughie’. There, he quickly learnt the importance of tone in Bernard Hall’s painting classes, with a focus on seventeenth-century Spanish artist Diego Velázquez. This retrospective will include key works from this time, some of which remained on display at the National Gallery School and have inspired successive generations of artists. Travelling ‘abroad’ was one of the greatest aspirations for artists of Ramsay’s era, and he had a studio in Paris, in the Boulevard St Jacques in Montparnasse, from February 1901 and for much of 1902. He painted some of his best works there, despite living on meagre rations in a freezing cold studio. His A student of the Latin Quarter 1901 epitomises the fulfilment of a bohemian ideal, while his engaging self-portraits, when shown together, reveal diverse facets of self. Jeanne 1901, a portrait of his concierge’s daughter, was one of four of his works shown in the New Salon in Paris, an exceptional feat for a young Australian artist. Jeanne and Miss Nellie Patterson 1903, painted on his return to
Bodies of Art: Human Form from the National Collection The National Gallery’s hit exhibition Bodies of Art continues to change like a living organism, evolving and adapting, with new works being added periodically and others coming down to be rested, or to go on loan such as Peter Paul Rubens’s oil painting Self-portrait 1623 or Francis Bacon’s Triptych 1970. The exhibition showcases works from the national collection, complemented by select loans, to examine the human figure, one of the most enduring subjects of art. Throughout time, gods, spirits and deities have been rendered in human form, with figures used for sacred, spiritual and religious worship and ceremonies. Representations of the body have changed as social conditions and artistic expressions evolve. Spanning art making across hundreds of years, this display invites viewers to consider what it means to be human. One of the most intriguing, and perhaps divisive, works to added recently is British artist Sarah Lucas’s Deep Cream Maradona 2015, a memorable sculpture from the 2015 Venice Biennale. The work is on loan from collector He Juxing, who has generously offered it for this exhibition (see pages 56–7 for more). Among other recent injections is Arthur Boyd’s Paintings in the studio: ‘Figure supporting back legs’ and ‘Interior with black rabbit’ 1973–74 and the exquisite nineteenth-century golden Buddha Shakyamuni carrying an alms bowl from Thailand.
Australia, are among the great child portraits in Australian art. Ramsay was especially close to his family and many of them feature in his art, the most notable portraits being those of his sisters Jessie, Margaret (known as Madge) and Nell, who feature in his greatest work, Two girls in white (also known as The sisters) 1904. His engaging letters to family members and his sketchbooks will also form an important part of this retrospective and will give added dimension to the story of this remarkable artist.
Above, from left: Hugh Ramsay Two girls in white (also known as The sisters) 1904, oil on canvas on hardboard. Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, purchased 1921; Bodies of Art: Human Form from the National Collection at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, July 2019.
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Contemporary Australian Architects Speaker Series 2019 Wednesdays 4 to 25 September
Art and Dementia Symposium 24 September Over the past twelve years, the National Gallery’s Art and Dementia
Now in its twenty-fourth year at the Gallery, the Contemporary
program has developed from an innovative new venture into an
Australian Architects Speaker Series continues to bring issues at the
internationally recognised exemplar for access and inclusion.
forefront of architectural design to architects and non-architects alike.
Established in 2007, the initial six-week pilot project aimed to
Every year, award-winning architects from around Australia present
develop a respectful, life-affirming gallery-tour model to improve the
on their most interesting or challenging projects. So come along to any
wellbeing of people with dementia. Regular tours and art-making
of the four weekly sessions held at the National Gallery in September
programs were established and soon proved to provide intellectual and
to satisfy your interest in architecture, buildings, public spaces, design
social stimulation and raise community awareness of the needs of people
philosophies, creative design solutions and more.
with dementia. In recognition of these onsite initiatives, the Gallery
The first speaker is Martyn Hook, from Iredale Pedersen Hook,
took a national leadership role in this area in 2010 by delivering Art
whose Yagan Square Project in Perth celebrates connections to land
and Dementia Outreach workshops in regional communities in each
and Indigenous culture and has won numerous awards at the 2019
state and territory. These workshops have now been held at thirty-nine
WA Architecture Awards. Jerry Wolveridge is up the following week.
galleries, contributing social solutions to the national challenge of an
He is the founder and director of Wolveridge Architects, a medium-
aging population.
sized architectural studio, internationally recognised for their highly
On 24 September, the impact and legacy of the Art and Dementia
considered projects and how they integrate with their environments.
program will be presented at a symposium at the National Gallery. The
Speaking in week three is Rebekah Clayton and Michelle Orszaczk, co-
evening event, open to the public, will provide national and international
founders of Clayton Orszaczk, a Sydney-based residential practice whose
perspectives. Highlights include Yoko Hayashi, founder of Arts Alive
Beach House was shortlisted for the Houses Award in 2018. And the final
Tokyo, who will present on the unique growth of this field in Japan.
week has Architecture Architecture’s director Michael Roper coming
Nathan D’Cunha, PhD candidate at the University of Canberra, who
up from Melbourne. Architecture Architecture’s design philosophy is
will share the results of his 2018 research study into bio markers for
underpinned by a firm belief in the potential of architecture to foster
stress and agitation conducted with participants in the Gallery’s Art and
positive environments at all scales of building, whether a backyard shed
Dementia program. The symposium will also be live-streamed.
or a city skyline.
For details closer to the date, go to nga.gov.au/whatson
The Contemporary Australian Architects Speaker Series is an enduring partnership between the National Gallery and the Australian Institute of Architects (ACT) Chapter and is supported by BCA Certifiers Australia.
More information and bookings at nga.gov.au/architects
Above, from left: Clayton Orszaczky, Beach House. Photo: Chris Warnes; The Art and Dementia program at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra.
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IN BRIEF
New hands-on studio From mid October It won’t be long now until the National Gallery opens the doors to its
to allow students and audiences anywhere in Australia to explore the
new Tim Fairfax Studio, the latest in a long line of dedicated spaces
riches of the collection in exciting new ways. And the Gallery’s travelling
offered for visitors to explore their creativity. The studio draws on lessons
exhibitions will be further enhanced by education and public programs
learnt from previous spaces, including the recently closed NGA Play, and
to activate regional schools, students and communities in a dialogue
from various approaches worldwide to make the experience of art for
with their national collection.
our young audiences ‘bigger and better’, as our Education Patron Tim Fairfax AC says. Opening in mid October, the studio will provide opportunities for
These are just some of the learning initiatives we have in store, all of which are made possible through Tim Fairfax’s vision and commitment to learning in art galleries (see pages 28–30 for an
creative responses to the collection by facilitating hands-on art making
interview with Tim). We look forward to sharing more with our visitors
activities. But, it’s not the only new learning initiative we are launching
during our Learning Launch events that coincide with the Gallery’s
this spring. Aside from the recently opened Tim Fairfax Learning
birthday in October: the National Schools Showcase on 11 October and
Gallery, where the national art collection is presented in a changing
the Art Learning Festival on 12 October.
program of thematic exhibitions developed with young people in mind
For details on our children’s programs and on the National
and with accessibility at its core, we will also have a Mobile Studio,
Schools Showcase and Art Learning Festival closer to the dates,
which will bring activities into gallery spaces, and a new teen program
go to nga.gov.au/whatson
(see pages 24–7). These are part of a suite of other initiatives committed to art education and lifelong learning that expands our learning program in three distinct areas: onsite, online and on tour. Online, we are offering digital learning resources linking the Gallery’s collection and exhibitions to the Australian school curriculum and a variety of creative applications
Above: Weaving workshop held in the Tim Fairfax Learning Gallery on Reconciliation Day, 1 June 2019.
ARTONVIEW 99 SPRING 2019
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EXHIBITION LISTING TRAVELLING
AT THE GALLERY MATISSE/PICASSO
YAYOI KUSAMA: INFINITY ROOM
DAVID HOCKNEY: PRINTS
Exploring the rivalry between Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso, one of the most important stories of modern art. 13 December 2019 to 13 April 2020 Adult $27.00 | Children 16 and under free Concession $24.00 | Member $21.00 Book now at ticketek.com or 1300 795 012
Cult contemporary artist Yayoi Kusama’s infinity room THE SPIRITS OF THE PUMPKINS DESCENDED INTO THE HEAVENS 2017. On now
Hockney’s printmaking practice through key works from the collection. 5 October to 1 December 2019 @ Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery
BODY LANGUAGE
LICHTENSTEIN TO WARHOL: THE KENNETH TYLER COLLECTION Exceptional works from the Kenneth Tyler collection by major artists active in America in the postwar period. 7 September 2019 to 9 March 2020
Sidney Nolan’s iconic paintings of the exploits of Ned Kelly and his gang. 21 June to 4 August 2019 @ Riddoch Art Gallery 16 November 2019 to 23 February 2020 @ Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory
Indigenous Australian cultural identity and language expressed through art. 11 May 2019 to February 2020
CONTEMPORARY WORLDS: INDONESIA Twenty of the most exciting emerging and established artists from Bali and Java’s key artistic centres. 21 June to 27 October 2019
BODIES OF ART: HUMAN FORM FROM THE NATIONAL COLLECTION Investigations of the human form throughout time. On now
HUGH RAMSAY Delve into the paintings, portraits and sketchbooks of Australian artist Hugh Ramsay. 30 November 2019 to 29 March 2020
THE NED KELLY SERIES
DEFYING EMPIRE: NATIONAL INDIGENOUS ART TRIENNIAL Contemporary art responding to the 50th Anniversary of the 1967 Referendum. 26 July to 13 October 2019 @ Mildura Arts Centre
ART DECO FROM THE NATIONAL COLLECTION: THE WORLD TURNS MODERN Stylish items from an age of jazz and flappers, glamorous fashion and design. 7 September to 27 October 2019 @ Ipswich Art Gallery 16 November 2019 to 2 February 2020 @ Horsham Regional Art Gallery
TERMINUS: JESS JOHNSON AND SIMON WARD An unforgettable virtual-reality experience by Jess Johnson and Simon Ward. 4 November 2019 to 1 March 2020 @ Heide Museum of Modern Art
NGA.GOV.AU 10
EXHIBITION LISTING
NEW BOOKS
Lichtenstein to Warhol: The Kenneth Tyler Collection 166 pages, hardcover | $34.95 By offering an almost limitless range of techniques in print workshops that celebrated collaboration, creativity and experimentation, master printer and publisher Kenneth Tyler attracted some of the most talented artists in America—Anni Albers, Josef Albers, Helen Frankenthaler, Nancy Graves, David Hockney, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, Joan Mitchell, Robert Motherwell, Claes Oldenburg, Robert Rauschenberg, Frank Stella, Donald Sultan and NATIONAL GALLERY OF AUSTRALIA
Andy Warhol. Many of the artists were breathtaking in their innovation and technical virtuosity in a revitalised era of printmaking in the latter half of the twentieth century, which has been labelled a ‘print renaissance’. Lichtenstein to Warhol: The Kenneth Tyler Collection features exceptional works from these major artists, together with dynamic candid photography that helps to explain the printmaking process and show the artists’ evolution.
By offering an almost limitless range of techniques in print workshops that celebrated collaboration, creativity and experimentation, master printer and publisher Kenneth Tyler attracted some of the most talented artists in America—Anni Albers, Josef Albers, Helen Frankenthaler, Nancy Graves, David Hockney, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, Joan Mitchell, Robert Motherwell, Claes Oldenburg, Robert Rauschenberg, Frank Stella, Donald Sultan and Andy Warhol. Many of the artists were breathtaking in their innovation and technical virtuosity in a revitalised era of printmaking in the latter half of the twentieth century that has been labelled a ‘print renaissance’.
‘I love new mediums. I think mediums can turn you on, they can excite you; they always let you do something in a different way, even if you take the same subject, if you draw it in a different way, or if you are forced to simplify it, to make it bold because it is too finicky, I like that.’ 52
David Hockney, 1980
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Contemporary worlds: Indonesia 140 pages, hardcover | $34.95 Charting the turbulent post-Reformasi period in Indonesia, from the fall of Suharto in 1998 to the present, Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia explores the vibrant and complex art of Australia’s closest neighbour. Showcasing twenty of the most exciting emerging and established artists from Bali and Java’s key artistic centres of Bandung, Yogyakarta and Jakarta, this book explores concepts ranging from sexuality, gender roles and family to environmental concerns, the art market, material and form, the everyday object and how we might listen to and learn from the sounds of Indonesia. Captivating painting, sculpture, installation, moving image, photography, textiles, live performance and film reflect the social and political change negotiated by Indonesia over the past twenty years. The publication is in English and Bahasa Indonesia.
All books and many more available at the Gallery Shop and online at shop.nga.gov.au. ARTONVIEW 99 SPRING 2019
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SPRING INTO CANBERRA
A SPRING CANVAS Canberra has been known for its spring-time flower spectacular Floriade (14 September to 13 October), bringing colour and life to the city, as people from around Australia travel to the capital. As the days warm and the gardens grow, the National Gallery invites visitors to bring along their loved ones for a spring experience. Whether you’re coming for the art or exploring the serene outdoor Sculpture Garden, this is the perfect place to celebrate colour and nature this season. From vibrant Pop Art to colourful life-size installations, start your spring experience at the Gallery inside with our exhibitions of the season, Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia and Lichtenstein to Warhol: The Kenneth Tyler Collection. Discover some spectacular additions to Bodies of Art such as Sarah Lucas’s Deep Cream Maradona 2015 and Fiona Lowry’s The ties that bind 2018. After the art, enjoy a coffee from our Street Cafe and take a stroll around the building to discover the secrets of our Sculpture Garden. Designed to highlight large public sculpture in the collection, the grounds overlooking Lake Burley Griffin are perfect this time of year. Landscaped with plants native to Australia, the garden’s design highlights the seasons of the year, so don’t forget to check out the Spring Garden full of seasonal grevilleas and acacias. Located close to the water, the luscious lawns are also the ideal spot for a picnic. From Antony Gormley’s Angel of the North 1996 to Bert Flugelman’s Cones 1982, appreciate some of the Gallery’s most impressive sculptures against the colourful canvas of spring. And, if you’re planning a lunchtime picnic, catch Fujiko Nakaya’s fog sculpture Foggy wake in a desert: An ecosphere 1982 in action any day between 12.30 and 2.00 pm. Nearby, you’ll find Fiona Hall’s secluded and beautiful Fern garden 1998 and on the other side of the Gallery, there’s our Australia Garden, where George Baldessin’s much-loved ‘Pears’ now sit. As the sun sets, James Turrell’s skyspace Within without 2010 is an unforgettable end to your day. Continue discovering the beauty of a Canberra spring with a visit to the National Arboretum, a swim down at the Cotter or a hike through the Namadgi National Park. Between a trip to the National Gallery, Floriade festivities and the natural landscapes of the capital, it’s the perfect way to discover Canberra’s glorious spring secrets for yourself.
Emile Bourdelle Penelope 1912, bronze. National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, purchased 1976
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KNOW MY NAME
18 artists
to start the conversation Artists in Australia and globally, historically and even today, are overlooked or underexamined simply because they are women. The National Gallery hopes to change this through its Know My Name campaign, and, as we develop a major exhibition for 2020, we thought to start the conversation with eighteen artists represented in the national collection.
1
Del Kathryn Barton
Barton’s work is characterised by jewel colours and elaborate surfaces in which all elements seem to writhe, sing and shout. The impetus for her images is diverse—Dada and Surrealism, classical mythology, personal memory and the lived experience of womanhood combine giddily. Rebecca Blake
‘I do feel that being a mother has made me a better artist … Everything is upside down and sideways and unexpected.’ Del Kathryn Barton
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KNOW MY NAME: 18 ARTISTS TO START THE CONVERSATION
‘The big feeling that small gives me is intimate and powerful.’ Clare Belfrage
Opposite: Del Kathryn Barton that’s when i was another tree 2, in That’s when I was another tree: a set 2007, lithograph. Gordon Darling Australia Pacific Print Fund, 2008. © Del Kathryn Barton Above: Clare Belfrage Fluence 2011, glass. Purchased 2012. © Clare Belfrage All works in this feature are from the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
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Clare Belfrage
Belfrage is a South Australian glass artist who draws inspiration from the patterns of
3
Pat Brassington
During the 1980s, Tasmanian artist Pat Brassington came to prominence for work
the natural environment, producing organic
that brought together photography and
forms with subtle, rhythmic surfaces. She
architectural space to produce extraordinary
is internationally renowned for her skills
experiences that were as compelling as they
in fine cane drawing, a technique in which
were unnerving. Her installations often
glass threads are drawn and worked across
suggested domestic spaces riddled with the
the blown-glass object while molten. These
horrors of family life. Her work at this time
delicate lines blur and interweave across
was undoubtedly some of the most original
the surface in shifting layers, evoking the
made by any artist in Australia. She has
steady and inevitable progress of time.
since become widely known and collected
Rebecca Edwards
for single pictures and series that play with the legacy of surrealism and its capacity to elicit particular kinds of psychic responses. Anne O’Hehir
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KNOW MY NAME: 18 ARTISTS TO START THE CONVERSATION
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Tamara Dean
Tamara Dean has maintained a successful career as a photojournalist alongside her arts practice, which comprises large-scale photographs of people immersed in idyllic landscapes. Her imagery draws heavily on the countercultural movement of the 1960s and 1970s to consider the intersections of humanity and ecology. In her photographs, young people seek out intimate connections to nature. She has recently stated that to ‘see ourselves as different and separate to the ecology and ecosystem of our planet is leaving humanity unprepared for the world we are shaping’. Anne O’Hehir
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Julie Gough
Much of the art and research practice of this Hobart-based artist, curator and academic refers to her own and her family’s experience as Tasmanian Aboriginal people. She works predominantly in sculpture, film and installation and is concerned with developing a visual language to express and engage with often conflicting and subsumed histories. In particular, her work reveals the complexities of Tasmania’s colonial past, and she mines
4
Megan Cope
By transposing names and places significant to Aboriginal groups onto old military and
5
archival texts and family histories to invite the viewer to question unresolved national
Destiny Deacon
Rebecca Edwards
A K’ua K’ua (far north Queensland) and Erub/ Mer (Torres Strait Islander) woman, Deacon
topographical maps that depict the land
has developed a major international profile
devoid of Aboriginal occupation, I seek to
for work that unpicks the racist iconography
reveal multilayered and multiple histories
of twentieth-century Australian culture. Her
and perspectives. Recreating traditional
work deliberately avoids established notions
markers in my sculptural installations, such as
of technical or pictorial refinement in favour
middens that were once unmistakable in our
of images and a style that look handmade,
country, similarly seeks to highlight alternative
effectively degendering and decolonising
historical narratives and to challenge people’s
expectations of technical or artistic ‘mastery’.
notions of ownership and connection to the
Humour also plays an important role, as
land. In this way my work aims to re-image
Deacon has said, ‘A belly-laugh makes it easier
and remap history and recreate our sense of
to slip the [political] knife in, when it’s least
place and identity. Artist statement for Defying
expected’. Anne O’Hehir
Empire: 3rd National Indigenous Triennial
stories and reconsider our roles within them.
Opposite: Pat Brassington Twins, from the series Gentle 2001, pigment print. Purchased 2001 Above: Destiny Deacon (K’ua K’ua and Erub/Mer peoples) Where’s Mickey? 2002, light-jet print from Polaroid original. Purchased 2006. © Destiny Deacon/ Copyright Agency
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installation, fibre art and shell work. As an
Island who is known for her strikingly
who commenced her public art career in
elder of the people of the Furneaux Islands, she
bold paintings that colourfully articulate
the 1970s when she, along with a number of
is one of the few senior women still practising
the landscape of her Country. Following
other elder Tiwi people, were living at Paru on
the art of shell stringing in a style that draws
an accomplished career working with the
Melville Island, just across the Apsley Strait
upon traditional Aboriginal practices. She
traditional crafts, she took up painting in 2005
from the community of Nguiu on Bathurst
sources her materials directly from the
at the age of eighty-one. Drawing upon the
Island. As with many Tiwi artists, Kantilla
coastlines of Tasmania, collecting thousands
dreamtime stories and knowledge amassed
rarely explained the symbols and designs in
of shells—many of which are unique to the
throughout her inspiring life of more than
her paintings, preferring to say simply that
region—and washing, drying and polishing
ninety years, she painted the world and stories
she paints like her father and her grandfather.
them before threading them together in unique
of her people. Rebecca Blake
Wally Caruana, edited extract from the
Lola Greeno
Lola Greeno is a well-respected Tasmanian Aboriginal artist who works across sculpture,
Mirdidingkingathi Juwarnda Sally Gabori Gabori was a Kaiadilt artist from Bentinck
combinations. Rebecca Edwards
‘A lot of my work is about cultural awareness, letting people know what we did, what we are doing … you’ve always got to be grounded in your own culture.’ Lola Greeno
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KNOW MY NAME: 18 ARTISTS TO START THE CONVERSATION
Kitty Kantilla (Kutuwalumi Purawarrumpatu)
Kantilla was one of the senior Tiwi artists
National Gallery of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art: collection highlights
Above: Yvonne Koolmatrie (Ngarrindjeri people) Bi-plane 1994, bilbili (sedge rushes). Purchased 1995 Opposite: Nonggirrnga Marawili (Madarrpa and Galpu peoples) Baratjala 2016, natural earth pigments and binder on eucalyptus bark. Purchased 2017. This acquisition was supported by Wesfarmers Arts in recognition of the 50th Anniversary of the 1967 Referendum
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Yvonne Koolmatrie
Koolmatrie is a highly respected Ngarrindjeri artist with more than thirty years experience as a weaver. Her work draws on the methods passed down by her ancestors, the Ngarridjeri people, who traditionally lived along, and drew sustenance from, the Murray River, making underwater traps to catch fish and eels from the sedge grass cultivated on the riverbanks. Koolmatrie continues to produce these traditional forms but has also pushed the method beyond the constraints of craft, ancient tradition and utility, creating imaginative sculptural objects. Rebecca Edwards
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Shirley MacNamara
MacNamara spent most of her early childhood moving between remote cattle stations with her parents and siblings across Camooweal, the Alyawarre lands and surrounding country. She favours natural materials such as spinifex, a native grass abundant throughout her people’s beloved country in remote northwest Queensland. Drawing inspiration from natural forms, her evocative weavings reflect the environment, intertwining vestiges of the landscape with her personal and ancestral stories. Rebecca Blake
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Nonggirrnga Marawili
Marawili is a revered artist from BukuLarrnggay Mulka in Yirrkaka, Northern Territory, and is well known for her intricate bark paintings. Inspired by the dynamic energy of the land, her work evokes the movement of the elements wind, water, fire and earth. Her solo exhibition Noŋgirrŋa Marawili: from my heart and mind was held at the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Sydney in 2018–19. Rebecca Blake
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Mirka Mora
Mirka Mora was a vital presence in Australian art. As a girl living in France during the Second World War, she was taken with her mother and sisters on the first stage of transportation to a concentration camp before her father secured their release. This awareness of suffering stayed with her, and a sense of it can be gleaned in the many angels and devils in her art. But she was determined to transform pain into joy and love and gave generously of herself through her art, public commissions and culinary ventures such as the Mirka Cafe, Cafe Balzac and Tolarno, all of which became vibrant cultural spaces. Deborah Hart and Elspeth Pitt
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Patricia Piccinini
Piccinini creates intermediary beings out of silicone and plastic that are either half animal and half human or combinations of nature and technology. While these hyperrealistic figures, with their hairy body parts and their sticky inside-out bits, might seem grotesque to some of us, at least at first, Piccinini also has an uncanny ability to imbue them with a recognisable and relatable humanity. Her work poses fundamental ethical and moral questions about the value of life and explores definitions about what might constitute life at the very boundaries between nature, technology, birth, creation and death. Jaklyn Babington
‘All my work is concerned with the definition of how what we consider artificial and natural is changing— the role that technology plays in our contemporary imagination.’ Patricia Piccinini
Above: Mirka Mora Dyonisos with horns 1980 (working drawings for Euripides’s play The Bacchae), watercolour, brush and inks. Purchased 1981. © Mirka Mora Opposite: Patricia Piccinini Subset—green body, from the series Protein lattice 1997, Type C colour photograph. Gift of Patrick Corrigan AM 2010. Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program. © Patricia Piccinini
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KNOW MY NAME: 18 ARTISTS TO START THE CONVERSATION
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Julie Rrap
For thirty-five years, Rrap has maintained a wide-ranging practice that has continually challenged social norms about the body and gender. Spanning across performance, body art, sculpture, painting, video, installation and photography, her work often draws on European art history and feminist theory to challenge social perceptions and historical narratives, especially in relation to the representation of women. Anne O’Hehir
Left: Julie Rrap Sister 1984, direct positive colour photograph. KODAK (Australasia) PTY LTD Fund 1984 Opposite: Yhonnie Scarce Thunder Raining Poison 2015, glass, wire, metal armature. Purchased 2016. This acquisition was supported by Susan Armitage in recognition of the 50th Anniversary of the 1967 Referendum. Image courtesy of the artist and THIS IS NO FANTASY
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KNOW MY NAME: 18 ARTISTS TO START THE CONVERSATION
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Yhonnie Scarce
Scarce is one of the first contemporary Aboriginal artists to explore the political power of glass. She wields the medium as a lens on history, to reveal stories and bear witness, bringing into focus the relentless impact of colonisation in Australia and the many injustices suffered by Aboriginal people. She describes her work as ‘politically motivated and emotionally driven’, bridging the personal and national experience of Australia’s First Peoples. Tina Baum
‘I think I’m in a position of power … compared to what my Ancestors and my grandparents had to deal with, I think I’m in a really great position to talk about their history and my history.’ Yhonnie Scarce
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Gemma Smith
There is a feel-good factor in sharing space with Smith’s work as though the colours and textures she melds are working over the eye and directly surging our dopamine levels. Formally, she is a serious abstract artist fiercely continuing a tradition set by many great artists before her, including many women. On another level, her paintings and sculptures expand and rewrite the leading tenets of abstraction— colour, form, line and volume—in surprising ways. Her prismatic boulders, for instance, articulate translucent colour planes as though they are light magnets, shifting and changing as the viewer moves around the object. Lara Nicholls
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NEW INITIATIVE
Teen takeover 24
TEEN TAKEOVER
Celeste Aldahn introduces the National Gallery’s new teens programming, which will capture a new audience and embed the experience of art for audiences of all ages.
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TEEN TAKEOVER
Pages 24–5: Canberra teens posing in front of Emily Kam Kngwarray’s The Alhalkere suite 1993. Canberra Pages 24–5 and opposite: teens come in to discover Opposite: Canberra teens their get National Gallery. creative at the National Gallery. Uji ‘Hahan’ Handoko Eko Saputro and Adi ‘Uma Gumma’ Kusuma’s Silent operation: Sign study based on the formula of contemporary (visual) art 2019 in Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia, until 27 October 2019.
The National Gallery is thrilled to present Art IRL (‘in real life’ for the
and workshops led by talented teens, artists and arts professionals.
uninitiated), an ongoing program that offers real-life encounters with
Each event will be uniquely inspired by the art, artists and ideas that Each event
art for younger audiences—the next generation of artists and thinkers—
shape the Gallery’s exhibitions and displays, ensuring we illuminate
thanks to the generosity of our Education Patron Tim Fairfax AC. The
the stories of our country from diverse perspectives. Participants can
program is the first of its kind for the Gallery and one of the few teen-
expect out-of-this-world experiences, free snacks, live music and social
exclusive offerings in Canberra. In its delivery, the Gallery joins a global
activities that respond to real-life trends, technology and social issues.
community of cultural institutions who see teens as active players in
Importantly, these events will be parent and teacher free, although
making and forging culture.
they will be supported by Gallery staff, hosts and artist-educators
Modelled on successful initiatives at peer organisations in Australia and abroad, Art IRL builds on research gathered in the Whitney Museum of American Art’s report Room to Rise: The Lasting Impact of Intensive
who will facilitate a space for teens to cultivate their own their own culture, who will facilitate not just receive it. receive it. not just On Saturday 7 December, the Gallery will host the epic Art IRL
Teen Programs in Art Museums, which explores the deep and lasting
after-hours to launch our new teen programs. Between 6.00 and
impact teen-specific art programs in museums can have on participants
9.00 pm, the building will come alive as teens takeover to experiment, 9.00 pm,
and their larger communities.
create, dance and think alongside professional artists and hundreds
The report found that when ‘young people are immersed in
of their peers. This festival-style event just for teens will include a
a learning environment that blends contemporary art, meaningful
dynamic program of activities built in collaboration with leading
collaborative work with peers, and supportive interaction with artists
cultural institutions and local youth groups. Through this collaboration, cultural institutions
and museum staff, they are inspired to see the world differently … Even
the Gallery hopes to generate region-wide engagement, with a
years after teens have completed their programs, these experiences
synonymous vision to positively inform the future of young audiences
continue to play a role in their perceptions of themselves, their
and museums.
capabilities, and their environment … they become problem solvers,
Art IRL is a significant new contribution to a broader reimagining
decision makers, and community builders—qualities they carry forward
of the Gallery’s programs for audiences in their formative years,
into adulthood’.
The Tim integral to which is the very generous support of Tim Fairfax. The Tim
Excitedly, Art IRL will maintain a focus on peer-led learning, with programming developed in collaboration with the Gallery’s first
Fairfax Learning Gallery, Tim Fairfax Studio and the Mobile Studio the heart of these programs and will enhance and increase are also at the heart
Teen Council, comprising twenty young creatives who will also assist in
opportunities for meaningful encounters with art. Launching soon, opportunities for
delivering events for young audiences. Over the course of the year, this
the studio will be a place for people of all ages to creatively explore
diverse group of teens will work closely with Gallery staff to co-produce
ideas when they visit—although, it will become a teen-only zone during
programs for their peers onsite, online and on tour. Among their
Art IRL after-hours—while the Mobile Studio is a portable ‘makerspace’ Art IRL
champion projects will be the Gallery’s flagship Art IRL after-hours,
that will pop up in different spaces around the Gallery. By championing
delivered four times a year.
a social relationship between the Gallery and our younger audiences,
Strictly for high school students aged twelve to eighteen, Art IRL after-hours will offer three hours of activities, pop-up performances
we hope that visitors will find a meaningful and lasting place for the we hope in their lives. visual arts in their
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TIM FAIRFAX Philip Bacon, gallerist, philanthropist and director of the National Gallery Foundation Board, talks to former Council member and now fellow Foundation director Tim Fairfax AC about his eight and a half years on Council and his generous support of the Gallery’s acquisitions and programs, particularly art education for our young audiences.
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TIM FAIRFAX
Philip Bacon: Tim, having just completed the maximum three terms on the National Gallery’s Council, what was the most rewarding part of it? Tim Fairfax: Probably just working with the Gallery itself, with the different directors and staff. And also working with other members of the Council, who all bring different areas of expertise to the Gallery, financial expertise, artistic, curatorial, you name it. Philip: With your support for various acquisitions, and there’s been so many, but I think one particular work, the great Matisse cutout Oceania, the sea, which is going to be in the Matisse Picasso show, how do you decide what you’ll support when directors come to you with suggestions? Do you rely on them to say what they think is a good thing for the Gallery to buy? Tim: It’s really a gut feeling. It comes down to ‘Do I really think the Gallery should have this work of art?’ If I feel that this is a great work of art that the National Gallery should have, then I don’t second-guess it. Philip: And it must be great when you walk around a great show, like Matisse Picasso coming up, to see something with your name on it, not because it’s got your name on it, necessarily, but just for the fact that it’s there because of you. Tim: And the fact that, in the case of Oceania, the sea, it was the missing link. The Gallery already had Oceania, the sky, so it was an important acquisition in that respect. Philip: To complete the set. And, to think only a handful of galleries worldwide have the pair. Your support of art education and access, then, where did that start? Tim: I suppose I’ve always been a great believer in art and education, particularly at a young age. And I looked at someone like Betty Churcher, who was a great educator, and thought let’s do something at the National Gallery to bring art education to the forefront. Philip: It probably also plays into your interest in the bush, because you’ve supported education in regional areas for years, haven’t you? Tim: We know that the arts is not well supported in regional and rural schools. Whether it’s the visual arts, drama, singing or ballet or whatever, there’s a huge lack of resources. So, if we can promote art education by having the expertise travelling out there to facilitate workshops, particularly at regional galleries, that’s a great thing.
Opposite: Tim Fairfax and Nick Mitzevich in Body Language, the inaugural exhibition in the National Gallery’s new Tim Fairfax Learning Gallery, June 2019. Right, from top: Body Language, looking into the international art galleries; featuring Christopher Pease’s painting Cow with Body Paint 2007 and Kitty Kantilla’s sculptures Female figure and Male figure c 1996; featuring Warwick Thornton’s single-channel moving-image works Way of the Ngangkari #2, #6 and #3 2015.
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Philip: Well, you know that personally, don’t you, from when your kids were being educated in country Queensland? And it’s part of the National Gallery’s remit, with an emphasis on ‘National’. It’s not just Canberra-centric, the outreach part is also very important. And so many great shows tour from the Gallery. I suppose you support those, too? Tim: Yes, my kids were the ones that came home and said how fabulous it was that a particular artistic group came through town. They loved it. I also like to support the digitisation of the collection, another part of outreach and access for people that are unable to visit Canberra. Philip: That’s a big job, digitising the collection, because how many works are in it, 160 000? Do you go in with your camera and help? Tim: [laughs] No, but it is important for the public to be able to access the collection, whether it’s schools, universities or individuals. Philip: Then there’s the Summer Art Scholarship. What is that exactly? Tim: Every year in January, the Gallery brings in sixteen students who are entering Year 12 to do a weeklong program. They look behind the scenes, and they’re all from different schools in every state. I try to make it to Canberra while they’re there because it’s a real eyeopener, and some of them go on to become household names, as a curator, an educator, an artist or a regional director, whatever. Philip: To get that start, that insight. You’ve also just opened the Tim Fairfax Learning Gallery. Is that like a children’s gallery? Tim: In a way, but bigger and better. It’s an educational facility for children. And Nick, the Director, as you know, is also looking at developing programs for teenagers. Philip: That’s a good idea. And the Tim Fairfax Studio that opens in Octyober, is that for artists particularly? Tim: No, it’s for children again. It’s all for children. Philip: Now that your maximum term at the Gallery is up, I imagine there’ll be a sense of regret on behalf of the Gallery and the staff, as you and Gina have been a much-loved part of the organisation. Do you see your interest in the Gallery continuing? Tim: Oh yes, I’ve been appointed to the Foundation Board, so there will still be involvement—and I’m also involved with the National Portrait Gallery. Philip: It’s been many years since I was on the Council, but it’s a bit like being ordained a priest. Even if you leave the priesthood, you’re still really a priest in all sorts of ways. Tim: [laughs] But it’s a lovely way of still being connected, it’s not Above: Body Language, at the National Gallery until February 2020, featuring Dundiwuy Wanambi’s figues Wawilak Sisters 1995–96 and photomedia by Robert Fielding, Ali Gumillya Baker, Shen Damien and Ricky Maynard..
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NATIONAL GALLERY COUNCIL
onerous and it’s worth being involved. Philip: Well, the National Gallery is such an amazing resource, and it’s great that people like you have been so willing to support it and to ensure its continuation.
MA JOR PARTNERSHIP
WESFARMERS ARTS Shane Nelson reflects on the success of the National Gallery’s ten-year partnership with Wesfarmers Arts and reveals some of what’s coming next.
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Page 31 and left: Wesfarmers Indigenous Art Leadership graduates in James Turrell’s skyspace Within without 2010, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 2018. Opposite: Culture to Catwalk, a showcase of cultural adornment as contemporary Indigenous fashion, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 6 July 2018.
such an achievement and to be surrounded by undeniable Indigenous leaders’, says Rebecca Ray, who went through the leadership program in 2018. Wesfarmers Arts has also supported many other facets of the Gallery’s Indigenous programs since our partnership began a decade ago, including our National Indigenous Art Triennial, which, since it began in 2007, has attracted large audiences to the Gallery and to many regional galleries in Australia and overseas, as it tours each time. Importantly, this powerhouse visual arts partnership has remained organic and has grown and developed over the years to target areas of need. In 2017, the Gallery and Wesfarmers recommitted to the partnership in support of our leadership, scholarship and fellowship programs but also with a flagship major international touring exhibition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art in mind. An Indigenousled and Indigenous-developed initiative, the exhibition will showcase some of the best of the collections of both organisations as it travels to Singapore and cities in China. The exhibition will show rare works The National Gallery of Australia and Wesfarmers Arts, our longstanding
from the 1800s through to Albert Namatjira’s renowned watercolours,
Indigenous Arts Partner, have been collaborating since 2009 to redresses
the dynamic Papunya movement and contemporary works by some
the imbalance of Indigenous Australian arts workers in the visual arts
of Australia’s best artists. ‘We are grateful and honoured to grow
industry and, more broadly, to provide opportunities for Australians
our partnership with Wesfarmers’, says the Gallery’s Director Nick
to experience and learn about the incredible richness and diversity of
Mitzevich, ‘They have shown that generosity and leadership in the arts
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander art and culture.
can make a major difference in the cultural lives of Australians’.
The partnership began in 2010 after a period of intensive industry and community consultation in 2009, which signalled a need for
to contribute to increasing Indigenous participation in the arts sector in
bridging programs that would bolster the involvement of Indigenous
Australia as well as internationally in collaboration with global museum
Australians in the arts industry, build on their existing skills and help
partners. The National Gallery and Wesfarmers have invested in building
develop a new generation of arts workers that could contribute their
significant relationships with alumni and Indigenous communities over
cultural understanding and knowledge to all areas of the industry.
the past ten years, and, in recognition of our ten-year anniversary, and
With the support of Wesfarmers Arts, the Gallery then developed and
forming part of our tenth leadership program, the Gallery is planning a
implemented an annual leadership program and a Fellowship.
three-day Indigenous Visual Arts Leadership Symposium to be held at
Since then, ninety-four Indigenous arts professionals have graduated from the leadership and fellowship programs. And, after
the beginning of November. The symposium will acknowledge the International Year of
this year’s program in November, the number of alumni will be over
Indigenous Languages and align with key elements of the Australian
one hundred. The leadership program has been recognised in the
Museums and Galleries Association report First Peoples: A Roadmap for
visual arts industry as critical stepping stone for Indigenous visual
Enhancing Indigenous Engagement in Museums and Galleries launched
arts workers.
earlier this year and written by our new member of Council, and first
The success of this program comes not only from the partnership
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The leadership, scholarship and fellowship programs will continue
Indigenous Australian on the Council in twenty years, Terri Janke. It will
with Wesfarmers Arts but also from the extraordinary interest and
include industry leaders, among whom will be leadership program
participation of Indigenous arts workers from all over Australia,
alumni who have contributed significantly to the visual arts industry
each bringing his or her own diverse set of skills and abilities to the
since their time with us. The symposium will be held at National Gallery
table, including curatorial, education, registration, conservation and
in Canberra from 1 to 3 November, and some key sessions will be
community development. ‘I feel privileged to be able to be a part of
streamed online for regional and remote audiences.
WESFARMERS ARTS
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LICHTENSTEIN TO WARHOL
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CURRENT EXHIBITION
Pages 34–5: Roy Lichtenstein Reflections on Minerva, from the series Reflections 1990, lithograph, screenprint, woodcut, metalised PVC plastic film collage and embossing. Purchased with the assistance of the Orde Poynton Fund 2002. © Estate of Roy Lichtenstein/Copyright Agency Above: Andy Warhol Vote McGovern 1972, colour screenprint. Purchased 1973. © The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc/ARS. Licensed by Copyright Agency All works in this feature are from the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
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LICHTENSTEIN TO WARHOL
Jane Kinsman highlights master printer Ken Tyler’s extraordinary contribution to the printmaking renaissance of the latter half of the twentieth century on show in the Gallery’s new exhibition Lichtenstein to Warhol: The Kenneth Tyler Collection from 7 September.
By offering an almost limitless range of techniques in print workshops
vision, required a degree of selflessness on the part of the printer and
that celebrated collaboration, creativity and experimentation, master
workshop staff—the artist had to come first. As long-term collaborator
printer and publisher Kenneth E Tyler AO attracted some of the most
Frank Stella observed of Tyler during the National Gallery’s ‘Birthday
talented artists in America in the latter half of the twentieth century,
Lecture’ delivered by Stella, Tyler and David Hockney in 1999: ‘He is
many of whom were breathtaking in their innovation and technical
more driven than the artists he works with: he won’t go home before you
virtuosity. It was a revitalised era of printmaking that was labelled a
do, he’s always there and, in the end, he’s always there for you’. This was
‘print renaissance’ by art historian Riva Castleman in her Printed art:
the philosophy that Tyler applied to his collaborations with artists at his
a view of two of 1980.
workshops on the west and east coasts of the United States.
The work of this time, particularly by the artists working with
Drawn exclusively from the National Gallery of Australia’s
Tyler, is testament to not only the renewal of printing techniques
collection, the works in Lichtenstein to Warhol show how these gifted
but also the revitalisation of printing through innovation, the
artists, with Tyler’s help, were able to experiment with innovative
development of larger scales and the freedom of working without
approaches to printmaking and extend the possibilities of their art
conventional restrictions and preformed ideas about what printmaking
practice for the future. Rauschenberg, for instance, matched Tyler’s
should or could do. Tyler recently reflected on his early ambition:
obsession with breaking the rules and playing with various techniques,
‘My vision from the start was to move the needle from the ordinary
scale and collage, and the most outstanding work to come from their
to outstanding innovative uses of the printmaking and papermaking
early collaborations was the 1.83-metre Booster 1967. By its size and
mediums’.
complexity, where multiple techniques were employed, Booster was a
The success of this vision is evident in the works on display in the Gallery’s new exhibition Lichtenstein to Warhol: The Kenneth
key step in the evolution of the original print. Johns’s Color numeral series 1969 and his humorous and deadpan
Tyler Collection, opening on 7 September. The exhibition exemplifies
Lead reliefs series 1969–70 were produced with Tyler and feature some
the ‘print renaissance’ that Castleman recognised early on through
of his most iconic and recurrent motifs, including the American flag, a
the innovations that artists developed with Tyler in his workshops.
light bulb and numerals. Oldenburg created Profile Airflow in 1969, a
This includes works by artists such as Anni Albers, Josef Albers,
translucent polyurethane relief of the car within an aluminium frame
Helen Frankenthaler, Nancy Graves, David Hockney, Jasper Johns, Roy
over two colour lithographs. Oldenburg’s vision was to create a large-
Lichtenstein, Joan Mitchell, Robert Motherwell, Claes Oldenburg, Robert
scale version of the 1936 Chrysler Airflow, his favourite car. According to
Rauschenberg, Frank Stella, Donald Sultan and Andy Warhol. Warhol,
Tyler, this was the ‘most ambitious project’ he encountered at the time. It
closely guarded by his associates, was able to create only work with
was a groundbreaking use of plastic that extended the idea of what could
Tyler, the very witty and satirical Vote McGovern 1972.
be created in a print workshop.
Tyler’s devotion to working with an artist, changing, evolving and inventing in response to the needs and wants of their talents and
Tyler’s work with Josef Albers over the years produced extraordinary prints that achieved a level of precision previously
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unheard of in screenprinting. The two had met in 1963 and collaborated on the highly influential series of lithographs White line squares in 1966. Albers demanded faultless colour matching and would bring in a leaf or twig found in the garden or scraps of paper or paint samples from his studio, the colour of which Tyler would then replicate with inks. The series Gray instrumentation II 1975 reveals Albers’s extraordinary knowledge of colour and honed understanding of form, which was achieved through Tyler’s technical knowhow. Josef’s wife and fellow artist Anni Albers created an exquisite series of works with Tyler, Triangulated intaglio, in 1976. Informed by her Bauhaus training in textile design, it features precise arrangements of triangles. A recurring motif in both her weaving and prints, the triangles are delicately printed in etching and aquatint in black, red and blue. In this series, the slight three-dimensional quality inherent to the intaglio technique provides a further complexity to her overall design. She was one of a group of women living on the East Coast who were to join Tyler at his workshops. After Tyler had left Gemini GEL in Los Angeles in 1973, he initially established a workshop in Bedford Village in New York State. With the new workshop came a new approach to collaboration. Time to experiment, new technology and an apartment where artists could stay meant that the newly formed Tyler Workshop was a different creative environment to that of Gemini GEL. Frankenthaler, Mitchell, Graves and other women became regular collaborators, and their works in Lichtenstein to Warhol show their unique visions and contributions to the print renaissance. Many other examples of Tyler’s wizardry with printmaking and his matching of artists with techniques, both tried and true and innovative, can be discovered in Lichtenstein to Warhol. Remarkably, too, Tyler was adamant about documenting his work with artists and kept a rich depository of candid photographs, video and audio recordings, which form part of the National Gallery’s Kenneth Tyler Print Collection alongside over 7400 editioned prints, proofs, drawings, paper works, screens, multiples and illustrated books. Thanks to Tyler’s generosity, this is the most comprehensive collection of postwar American art outside the United States and a rich source of information on American printmaking and printmakers from the second half of the twentieth century. The Gallery has a website dedicated to the collection, which Tyler likens to ‘a virtual institute for fine art printmaking’, which reveals, ‘the people and processes, the techniques and equipment, and the history of the multi-media environment of my workshops and, in a broader sense, creativity through innovation’. The Gallery will continue to add images, candid photographs, audio and film to this ‘living’ website, ‘instilling it with in-depth material’, as Tyler says, ‘for any and all interested in my decades of printmaking and, collectively, the breadth Above: Robert Rauschenberg Booster, from the series Booster and 7 studies 1967, colour lithograph, screenprint. Purchased 1973. © Robert Rauschenberg. VAGA/Copyright Agency Opposite, clockwise from top left: Jasper Johns Figure 7 and Figure 8, from the series Color numeral 1969, colour lithographs. Purchased 1973. © Jasper Johns. VAGA/Copyright Agency; Claes Oldenburg Profile Airflow 1969, moulded polyurethane relief over two colour lithograph, aluminium. Purchased 1973. © Claes Oldenburg and Coosje Van Bruggen
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LICHTENSTEIN TO WARHOL
and power of printmaking as an ever-expanding medium’. The website is complemented by our ever-growing social media, across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and the Kenneth Tyler Collection Blog.
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Photos from the Kenneth Tyler archive David Greenhalgh picks out a few candid photographs from the Gallery’s extensive Kenneth Tyler photographic archive, which takes us behind the scenes with the many artists that master printmaker Ken Tyler has worked with over the years.
At art school, Paul Jenkins was ejected from his painting class after eating the fruits the teacher had composed for a still life exercise. Jenkins later stated that ‘the pear is to be eaten and experienced, not painted’. As part of the Abstract Expressionist movement, Jenkins had a focus on his inner life, creating images that reflected his
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PHOTOS FROM THE KENNETH TYLER ARCHIVE
spiritual explorations of the Tao Te Ching along with the teachings of modern-day mystics such as George Gurdjieff. Here he works in the Tyler Graphics print studio driveway, dying handmade papers.Photo: Steven Sloman, 1980
Here, Stella works in the print studio on a preparatory painting for his Newfoundland print series, as his children watch on. Three years earlier, Stella had resisted the idea of working in lithography, as he knew nothing about it. Kenneth Tyler concealed a lithographic tusche in a marker pen in an attempt to make the medium accessible to Stella. Tyler and Stella would go on to collaborate for almost fifty years after this cunning invention. Photo: Malcolm Lubliner, 1970
Surrounded by his Homage to the square series, Josef Albers chats with Ken Tyler in Connecticut in 1969. Albers began this series in 1950 and continued it for some twenty-five years. He produced hundreds of such works that earnestly conveyed the perception of colour to the eye, through the recurring motif of layered squares. Albers took great pride in that fact that his lectures at Yale University on this topic attracted a large number of non-artists seeking a visual understanding of the world.
At a time when the Abstract Expressionists were ‘heroically’ expressing themselves through sweeping gestural paintwork, Jasper Johns caught the attention of gallerist Leo Castelli for doing the complete opposite. Influenced by Marcel Duchamp, Johns preferred that ‘the artist’s hand is left unexplored, as though the best operation would leave no souvenir of the Surgeon’. His Lead relief series, made at Gemini GEL print studio, examined commonplace objects in a cold, detached manner. Nonetheless, here we catch Johns in the act of applying oil paint to the ‘Bread’ edition. Photo: Malcolm Lubliner, 1969
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Robert Rauschenberg was invited by NASA in 1969 to produce a series of works with Ken Tyler that reflected on the Apollo 11 mission. Known as the ‘Stoned Moon’ series, these large-scale lithographs were accompanied by a poem by Rauschenberg who witnessed the shuttle launch: ‘Softly, largely, slowly, silently, Apollo 11 started to move up. Then it rose being lifted on light. Standing mid-air it began to sing happily loud’ Photo: Malcolm Lubliner, 1969
Roy Lichtenstein once said that his Surrealist works from the late seventies ‘were of no particular Surrealist, just Surrealism in general’ and sought to mix influences and imagery. In the centre of this studio portrait is his painting Nude on beach 1977, which also depicts a slice of Swiss cheese. Lichtenstein became interested in depicting Swiss cheese from 1961 onwards because it always reminded him ‘of Jean Arp paintings or wall reliefs’. Photo: Kenneth Tyler, 1977
Joan Mitchell sits by the fire in her house in Vétheuil, France. After the death of her mother in 1967, she bought two acres of land with a small cottage that Claude Monet once called home. Having previously lived in a tiny apartment in Paris, Mitchell recalled in a 1986 interview: ‘Well, that really changed unconsciously an awful lot of [my practice]’. With more space, Mitchell found that she worked at a larger scale and with thick impasto paint, mainly because she did not have to roll up her canvases when taking them out of the building, as she had to in Paris. Photo: Marabeth Cohen-Tyler, 1991
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PHOTOS FROM THE KENNETH TYLER ARCHIVE
Claes Oldenburg rests on his Ice bag—scale A 1969. This work was originally going to be made in collaboration with Disney for the Art and Technology Program at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Following extensive negotiations, the project fell through due to Disney’s ‘disapproval’ of the project and the growing costs. Part of his original plans included a giant toothpaste tube; an undulating green jelly mould; eggs that would crack, scramble and reconstitute themselves and a pie that would imitate being eaten. Instead, the work would be completed in 1969 by Krofft Enterprises. Photo: Malcolm Lubliner, 1969
Discover more at nga.gov.au/ internationalprints/tyler
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CURRENT EXHIBITION
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CONTEMPORARY WORLDS: INDONESIA
Alia Swastika focuses on some of the women artists in Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia who have progressed feminist thinking in Indonesia outside of the country’s largely disinterested academic circles.
Discussions on the position of women in art history, and the production
those produced in the twenty-first century. This presentation of
of knowledge, are now fairly common in western academic circles. In
works of art across mediums demonstrates how artists explore the
Indonesia, however, debates on gender disparity in art history have
vast possibilities of art as a discipline; not only creating objects out of
occurred mostly in non-academic settings, outside the country’s
observation or imagination but also using works of art to perform a
educational institutions—which should, in reality, bear most of the
social function: ethnographer, researcher and activist.
burden in broadening dialogue on gender issues in art. Indonesian artists
In fact, research-based art is a common thread in the work of
often complain about the absence of specialised art history programs in
women artists in this exhibition and, interestingly enough, almost all
art schools and, to make matters worse, not enough attempts are made
of their works involve some element of performativity. The relationship
to connect gender studies with the discipline of art history. For these
between gender, body and performance emerged as a prominent
reasons, gender perspective is almost completely lacking in Indonesian
discourse in the late 1960s. Judith Butler used the term ‘performativity’
art history.
to illustrate how gender is instituted by the body as part of human
Although a feminist art history needs to begin from within the
identity. The word ‘perform’ also demonstrates a tension between the
existing version, the ubiquitous question, ‘Are there women artists
private and the public body. If women artists initially used the body as
in the history of the arts?’, should be answered by turning our gaze
a metaphor for gender repression, performance ultimately becomes a
to exhibition catalogues, monographs, newspaper articles and art
strategic means of expression for various other issues.
reviews rather than to the canon. If we only look at canon sources, we
Melati Suryodarmo is a pioneer of performance art in Indonesia.
also run the risk of falling into the trap of an art history that has been
Having lived for almost twenty years in Germany, she presents a unique
moulded by masculine views. A feminist art history should then not
amalgamation of western thinking and eastern virtues, both merging as
only demand a longer list of women artists but also promote discourses
an entirely new system of knowledge in her body of work. Her education
that acknowledge marginalised aesthetic trends that run counter to
and life in Germany directly exposed her to western feminist ideals,
mainstream art history.
colliding with her childhood experience in patriarchal Java. Her works
In Indonesia, the tension between individuals and the collective,
sharply and intelligently reflect a subversive interpretation of the two
subjectivity and social norms, the personal and the political was the
poles by using visual language based on conceptual ideas while at the
fundamental point in gender discourses that consumed a transitional
same time signifying her strong traditional roots. Through performance,
generation of women who grew up with both New Order repression
she turns her body into a medium to express her inner thoughts,
and post-Reformasi freedom. Unlike western third-wave feminists,
evoking a strong sense of individualism. To me, there is something
whose discourses have infiltrated the realms of subjectivity and personal
inherently feminist in Suryodarmo’s work that is unlike any other
narratives—and where the rights of women as individuals, including their
woman artist in Indonesia.
sexual rights, have become a crucial issue—Indonesian feminist thinkers,
Tita Salina’s work involves a performance piece in which she
including its women artists, often still have to restrict themselves from
explores the northern coastline of Jakarta, revealing a multitude of
discussing important larger political issues, thus putting sensitive issues
problems as a result of clashes between land and sea, natural and
such as legal abortion on the back burner.
artificial and politics and survival by referring to the most recent cases
The works of women artists featured in Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia showcase a wide range of issues and approaches, particularly
of marine exploitation in the region. Salina envisions an island made entirely out of garbage, with her paddling on the water surrounded by
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piles of trash. Her presence—as a citizen, as a human being—against the backdrop of the sea and industrial waste presents layers of interpretation for the audience to codify. In a performance piece in collaboration with a sufi dancer, Mella Jaarsma designed the dancer’s suit by borrowing images from landscape paintings commonly displayed on becaks (cycle rickshaws), which she saw during her residency in Jatiwangi in West Java. Jaarsma is interested in connecting imageries inspired by the landscape we see every day with the complexities of colonialism that gave birth to Mooi Indië art, as well as the daily life in Pantai Utara, a coastal region along the northern part of Java where Dutch East Indies governor-general Herman Willem Daendels built his infamous road. The sufi dancer became Jaarsma’s medium to portray the landscape from ‘above’, turning it into a spiritual experience. Octora demonstrates the openness of younger Chinese Indonesians to discuss the politics of identity after 1998. Not directly breaking the silence of the many complex issues involved in the chaos of Reformasi, when many Chinese people became victims, Octora’s intention is to claim back the colonial and masculine gaze. By capturing herself in Balinese costume from original photos sourced from the online resources of Leiden University, she shifts the gaze to focus on the female individual within the collective. She uses both the technology of digital imagemaking and performative acts to create a subversive reaction to colonial archives and to decolonise the western gaze of femininity. Following the end of the New Order, discourses in the women’s movement have focused on issues of gender discrimination, sexuality and personal history as part of the frontier of the ‘battle’. The body and the self both play an increasingly important role in the ongoing project of constructing identity, where questioning the notion of authenticity is part of the search. The appearance of the body adds to the rich diversity of what a woman can be in multicultural Indonesia, proposing a new voice in facing the dominant institutions of the state, religion and the collective.
This article is an edited extract from Alia Swastika’s essay ‘The private and the public body in the works of Indonesian women artists’ in the National Gallery’s book Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia, available at the Gallery Shop. Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia 21 June to 27 October 2019 Join the conversation #ContemporaryWorldsNGA
Page 44: Melati Suryodarmo Transaction of hollows 2016, durational performance at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 21 June 2019. © Melati Suryodarmo Left, from top: Tita Salina 1001st island—the most sustainable island in the archipelago 2015, singlechannel video. Courtesy of the artist. Photo: Irwan Ahmett; Octora Tat tvam asi #3 2017, print on steel. Courtesy of the artist Opposite: Mella Jaarsma The landscaper 2013, singlechannel video. National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, purchased 2018. Photo: Mie Cornoedus
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CONTEMPORARY WORLDS: INDONESIA
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ASIAN ART ON THE MOVE
COLLECTION DISPLAY
Asian art on the move Carol Cains previews the new Asian art galleries, which will open in early November and reveal fresh perspectives on the Gallery’s Asian art collection.
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ASIAN ART ON THE MOVE
Page 48: Ming dynasty (1368–1644, China) Goddess Tara 1426–35, bronze, gold, pigment. Purchased 1977 Page 49: Andhra Pradesh, India A ruler seated on an elephant c 1780, opaque watercolour and gold leaf. The Gayer-Anderson Gift 1954 Opposite: Coromandel coast, India Mawa or ma’a (ceremonial cloth and sacred heirloom) 19th century, handspun cotton, natural dyes, mordants. Gift of Michael and Mary Abbott 1988 Right: Endeh-Lio people, Indonesia Ana deo (male ancestor figure) 19th – early 20th century, wood. Purchased 2008 All works in this feature are from the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra
The Asian collection is on the move. After coming off display in July,
‘People’ explores concepts and functions of portraiture in a wide
the Gallery’s Asian art collection will return afresh from November. The
range of media and contexts, including Chinese funerary figures,
new display will be presented in galleries across two floors, connecting
Indonesian ancestor sculptures and modern Japanese woodblock prints
Australian art on level 1 and international art on level 2. The move has
and paintings. A suite of kabuki actor prints by Yamamura Koka, Natori
created an exciting opportunity to reimagine and reinterpret art from
Shunsen and Shiko exemplify the individuality and expressiveness of
across Asia, reveal works not shown before and celebrate the riches and
shin-hanga-style prints created in Japan in the first half of the twentieth
diversity of the Asian collection. Presented within a framework of four
century. Textiles and costume that signify personal identity, age, status
broad themes, the inaugural display will include sculpture, paintings,
and wealth and everyday objects that celebrate the skill of the maker
photographs, screens, scrolls, lacquerware, prints, drawings, textiles and
illustrate the interlaced lives of objects and individuals. A group of
decorative arts, with works dating from 2500 BCE to the present.
twelve Central Asian children’s caps, each embroidered with distinctive
The theme ‘Time and Place’ presents a group of watercolours, prints, photographs and devotional and natural history paintings produced in Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) between the late eighteenth
patterns and colours, articulates the social roles of costume, in this case, providing community identification and talismanic protection. ‘The Natural World’ includes an array of works that highlights
and the late twentieth centuries. These diverse works served
the breadth of the collection and of approaches to depicting nature in
multiple functions, documenting flora and fauna for British colonial
Asian art, including the celebration of the seasons, studies of animals,
administrators, providing pilgrimage souvenirs and objects of devotion
stories of mythological creatures and explorations of patterns inherent in
and celebrating the Mughal artistic legacy and the nationalist aspirations
natural forms. A group of nineteenth-century drawings and paintings of
of the Bengal School of Art.
elephants, accurately observed and portrayed with candour and humour,
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celebrates the animal’s ceremonial and military roles in Hindu Rajput courts. The drawings were selected from a rare and substantial group of Indian sketches in the collection, made as underdrawings for paintings or as records of motifs and events for later use. The largest section of the new displays focusses on the theme of ‘Devotion’, reflecting the important role of spiritual belief in the creation of works of art. Gods and spirits, ancestors, saints, guardians, teachers and eccentrics, text and narratives and pilgrimage sites and shrines are the subjects of the works on display. Works by contemporary artists Sri Lankan-born Ramesh Nithiyendran, the Philippines’ Rodel Tapaya, India’s Jangarh Singh Shyam and Indonesia’s Danga Iha sit alongside historical Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, Daoist, animist and ancestral images. Each expresses spiritual belief and ideas around portrayal of the divine, types of worship and the transmission of esoteric knowledge. A large pilgrimage map of Nathdwara, a region of Rajasthan believed to be the home of the Hindu god Krishna, illustrates the convergence of spiritual and physical landscapes in the context of pilgrimage. The painting maps the life of Krishna in scenes set in the landscape and architecture of the region. So that objects are represented in a respectful and appropriate manner, the new Asian displays are being developed in consultation with groups representing different cultural organisations and creator communities. Displays will consider feedback obtained about individual works and their potential sensitivities around a range of subjects, including representation of the deceased, cultural display conventions, language and naming preferences, curatorial interpretations, exhibition rationale (such as positioning of objects) and hierarchies within and across belief systems and any other cultural requirements, including the need for offerings, ceremonies and displays.
Left, from top: Shiko Nakamura Kichiemon as Ishikawa Goemon c 1920, painting on board. Gift of Dr Lee Kerr and Mark Henshaw 2015. Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program; Kato Shinmei Maiko, apprentice geisha 1976, mineral pigments on paper. Gift from the International Culture Appreciation and Interchange Society ICAIS, Japan 2016 Opposite: Ah Xian China China bust 80 2004, cast and hand-built porcelain in celadon glaze. Purchased 2009
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ASIAN ART ON THE MOVE
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COLLECTION DISPLAY
Urs Fischer’s Francesco Bianca Hill highlights the imminent return of Swiss artist Urs Fischer’s Francesco, which will once again beguile the Gallery’s audiences when it’s countdown to destruction begins anew in December.
Like a phoenix rising from its own flames, Urs Fischer’s Francesco will be reborn in the Gallery’s main foyer in December 2019—back by popular demand! When last seen in August, the figure of curator Francesco Bonami had been reduced to congealed masses of wax dribbles, unceremoniously pooled at the base of the refrigerator it had previously stood atop. In a pointed jab at the figure’s inescapable transience, the assortment of fruit and vegetables inside the refrigerator’s top compartment remained looking oddly fresh until the very end. Despite languishing in phases of dissolution, Fischer never allows Francesco to reach a point of total ruin—nor possible respite. Whereas the phoenix controls its own regeneration, Francesco must wait to be recast at the whim of the artist and the Gallery. Fischer’s early forays into candle-making were based on crudely hewn nudes from Styrofoam blocks. In more recent years, the artist’s characteristic ‘sloppiness’, as Bonami himself termed it, has been superseded by a desire to manipulate the real. Bonami’s figure was not carved by Fischer. His mundane form, hunched and staring down at his smartphone, was digitised using an optical scanner that collects millions of data points and combines them to generate a precise 3D model—a process now common in videogame development and film. From this computer rendering, Bonami’s doppelganger was made in polyurethane foam and entombed to create a positive mould, which could then be used to form the coloured wax. This mould and the licence to reproduce are Francesco’s metaphorical ashes. While the possibility of another rebirth is always present, just like any hope of the afterlife, it is never guaranteed and unlikely for some time, so do not miss this opportunity to see the spectacle of Francesco as he slowly unravels again.
Opposite: Urs Fischer Francesco 2017, Paraffin wax, microcrystalline wax, encaustic pigment, stainless steel, wicks, aluminum powder, steel, stainless steel hardware, bronze hardware, electrical wiring, LED light, AAA batteries. National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, purchased with the assistance of the National Gallery of Australia Gala Fund 2019. © Urs Fischer, courtesy Sadie Coles HQ, London
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URS FISHER’S FRANCESCO
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SARAH LUCAS
MA JOR LOAN
Sarah Lucas Bianca Hill takes a frank look at Sarah Lucas’s enormous Deep Cream Maradona 2015, which featured in the British Pavilion at the 2015 Venice Biennale and is now generously on loan from collector He Juxing for the National Gallery’s Bodies of Art.
The enormous ‘nob’ (British slang for a posh person, and an obvious
While the figure’s bravado is satirised with emaciated limbs
pun) that is Sarah Lucas’s Deep Cream Maradona 2015 has recently been
and lack of substance, the colour choice evokes desire. ‘Deep Cream’
inserted into Bodies of Art: Human Form from the National Collection.
is sensual for Lucas: ‘In fact, on him, it’s utterly seductive, to me. It’s
Lucas is among the illustrious alumni of the infamous Young British
something like custard or white chocolate. Something very sucky
Artists, known for their brazen shock tactics, artist-led initiatives and
and lickable’. By entangling his absurd and exaggerated body with
unashamedly postmodern practice. Deep Cream Maradona is a fitting
desire, Lucas establishes Maradona as an homage to classic Freudian
maturation after well and truly graduating from this cohort.
psychoanalysis—what symbolic power does our unconscious make of
The gargantuan figure reclines comfortably, if not a little boastfully, in the cavernous space in which Bodies of Art is installed. Hands behind
our genitals? Deep Cream Maradona’s lumpy surface is the result of
head, body arched and legs firmly planted and spread, the figure’s
Lucas’s sculpting method in which she stuffs nylon stockings with
testicles hang like good luck charms and its engorged but spindly
cotton wadding. This technique, which defined her iconic ‘Bunnies’
penis reaches for the sky. This pose draws clear erotic associations—the
(disempowered sets of headless female arms or legs), is solidified here
reclining female nude of European high art and the favoured view
in cast resin and used to confound Maradona’s suggested masculinity.
of male masturbation in pornography. The references are multiple,
His prominent testicles, and even his head, appear almost like comical
conflicting and hilarious.
sagging breasts, replete with knotted ends for nipples. These symbols
In an interview with journalist Charlotte Higgins, Lucas anointed the figure ‘the hand of God’. A wry nod to the Argentinean footballer Diego Maradona and his 1986 FIFA World Cup goal where he leapt into
of a flagging libido are juxtaposed against the stick figure’s inflated erection, which dwarfs and overshadows him—a ludicrous fantasy. Lucas has played with penises in her art for many years and
the air, punching an aerial ball past the keeper. She explains that the
lists the reasons why in her 2012 monograph: ‘appropriation, because
title is not a simple namesake, it was originally code for the Mexican
Idon’t have one; voodoo; economics; totemism; they’re a convenient
artist Diego Rivera, whose wife Frida Kahlo labelled him a lesbian due
size for the lap; fetishism; compact power; Dad; why make the whole
to his fabulous breasts and looks that no woman could resist. Despite
bloke?; gents; gnomey; because you don’t see them on display much; for
the pronoun ‘he’ being seemingly appropriate when referring to this
religious reasons having to do with the spark’. Deep Cream Maradona
work, Lucas purposefully complicates our inscribed codes of gender.
seems to tick all of these boxes, with the exception of being fit for the
An important act in a room full of bodies.
lap, but, perhaps most of all, compact power. Saturated in ‘Deep Cream’,
Deep Cream Maradona and its ‘Golden Cup’ doppelganger were the specials of the British Pavilion at the 2015 Venice Biennale. As Lucas
Lucas shows us that the hierarchy we create through difference is very real but also a bit of a joke.
mused in her diaristic catalogue, ‘The exhibition, I Scream Daddio, will resemble a dessert. A desert even. A mirage’. The gallery spaces and works were drenched in yellows and creams, with progressively more intentional reference to delectable things, ‘namely custard, ice-cream, eggs, bananas and sunshine’. The Maradonas were the first to be gilded, and the rest followed—partly out of necessity and partly on whim.
Opposite: Sarah Lucas Deep Cream Maradona 2015, resin, steel armature, gloss paint. Collection of He Juxing
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NEW ACQUISITIONS Uji ‘Hahan’ Handoko Eko Saputro and Adi ‘Uma Gumma’ Kusuma Indonesian artists Uji ‘Hahan’ Handoko Eko Saputro and Adi ‘Uma
Although dazzling and fun, the work is a considered assessment of
Gumma’ Kusuma’s Sign study based on the formula of contemporary
the contemporary art market from the perspective of one of Indonesia’s
(visual) art was recently commissioned and purchased by the
rising stars. A key theme in Hahan’s multidisciplinary practice is a
National Gallery for its exhibition Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia.
questioning and investigation of the dynamics of the market, this work
In the exhibition’s catalogue, Mikala Tai, Director of 4A Centre for
is a tongue-in-cheek observation of its machinations. The interactive
Contemporary Asian Art, describes this interactive installation as
game also encourages viewers to participate in the artists’ investigations
‘Hahan’s most ambitious work to date’, as it ‘transforms an entire gallery
by developing their own formulas for success as a contemporary artist.
into an immersive structural analysis of the art world’.
On display in Contemporary Worlds: Indonesia until 27 October, this
Comprising programmed, blinking neon lights and a specially designed digital application accessed via touchscreens in the gallery
interactive neon installation will challenge, confront, delight and amuse audiences of all ages.
space, the work is a multi-faceted extension of the collaborators’ earlier charcoal wall drawing The formula of contemporary (visual) art, first exhibited in 2015. As Tai points out, however, this new installation, ‘embodies a sense of contemporaneity often found at art fairs and biennales, with neon lights in competing colours’, and, ‘an interactive game application of a mind-map that seemingly tracks a route for success in the art world’.
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NEW ACQUISITIONS
Below: Adi ‘Uma Gumma’ Kusuma and Uji ‘Hahan’ Handoko Eko Saputro with their work Silent operation: Sign study based on the formula of contemporary (visual) art 2019, an installation comprising neon wall‑works and interactive game application, commissioned and purchased 2019.
Indonesian textiles The National Gallery’s renowned collection of historical Southeast
exemplary contemporary textiles by known creators from nine regions
Asian textiles was recently enhanced with the acquisition of a group
that illustrate the continuation of traditional techniques of dyeing and
of thirty-three exemplary contemporary Indonesian textiles. The
weaving and the evolution of designs and styles that complement the
works were selected from a collection assembled over the last twenty
Gallery’s existing collection of earlier Indonesian textiles.
years by Threads of Life, an organisation established by Jean Howe and
Each of the newly acquired textiles is superbly woven and dyed and
William Ingram in 1998 to address the near extinction of the textile
the identity of the artists involved in its production has been recorded.
arts in many Indonesian indigenous communities. By facilitating
This is in contrast to the anonymity of artists associated with most
the sustainable and profitable production of high-quality traditional
historical Asian textiles. The evolution of motifs and styles reflect social
textiles, the organisation has helped to ensure the survival of this major
change and trade, while the continuity of many forms has strengthened
Indonesian art form and its ongoing central role in the life of individual
the Gallery’s representation of Indonesian textiles. Four of the recent
communities in Indonesia. Threads of Life currently works with over a
acquisitions will be displayed in the new Asian galleries, scheduled to
thousand indigenous weavers, ninety per cent of whom are women, in
open in early November. Carol Cains, Senior Curator, Asian Art
forty groups across sixty villages on eleven islands. The textiles acquired by the Gallery were selected from the Threads of Life reference collection. Comprised of the finest textiles acquired from the most skilled weavers, the collection served as a design resource for the communities until the skills of weavers and dyers became established and the benchmark collection was no longer required. This provided the Gallery with a unique opportunity to acquire
Above: Leonardus Wou Kurry (ikat tier), Yuliana Paba (dyer) and Maria Meo Kurry (weaver) Lu’e (man’s shoulder cloth) 2006 (detail), commercial cotton, natural dyes. Purchased with the assistance of Meredith Hinchliffe 2019
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Howard Taylor Nature takes on another dimension in the hands of Howard Taylor, as he distils a sense of being enveloped within its intimate and expansive spaces rather than representing the landscape before us. Earlier this year, the National Gallery received a gift from Perth collector Dr Dax Calder of three major paintings and six drawings by Taylor, all of which embody this communion with the natural world as evoked in the spectator. Dating from the latter part of Taylor’s considered career, Forest river 1990–93, A hemisphere—by depth sounding for a four-fold screen 1992 and Discovery 2000 make compelling additions to the Gallery’s remarkable collection of the artist’s work. Discovery is at once both painting and sculpture, immediately asserting its presence as its concave form emerges outward from the wall. Evocative of earlier works in the national collection such as No horizon 1994 and his series of ‘forest figures’ and column sculptures, Discovery is a culmination in his lifelong interest in the relationship between light, dark, shadow and mass and their effect on form and perception. A hemisphere—by depth soundings from a four-fold screen is a profound example of the complex visual problems Taylor embraced in his practice. An earlier example in the collection is Planet 1988, which sits within a broader series of celestial works, including his ‘sun figures’ of the late 1980s. Unlike Planet, with its soft graduating tones, this newly acquired work draws together sound and colour as a force field, its yellow-white centre radiating out into ripples of emerald green to black. Taylor lived in Northcliffe in the far south-west region of Western Australia, and so much of his work is a response to the natural beauty and remoteness of this area, which is surrounded by national parks and dense state forests. He was particularly drawn to the Shannon River on which Forest river is based. His diary indicates how challenging the work was to make and how it occupied him intermittently over a period of four years. It provides a meandering serpentine view of the riverbed composed as an invitation to wonder at nature. Lara Nicholls, Assistant Curator, Australian Painting and Sculpture
Right: Howard Taylor Forest river 1990–93, oil paint, and A hemisphere—by depth soundings from a four‑fold screen 1992, synthetic polymer paint. Gifts of Dax Calder 2019. Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program. © Howard H Taylor Estate
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NEW ACQUISITIONS
Benjamin Armstrong Benjamin Armstrong became intrigued by the history of Port Essington
The series also delves into the metaphysical experience of
after reading Mark McKenna’s 2016 book From the edge: Australia’s lost
Australia’s colonial history. The works shimmer with iridescent and
histories. Located three hundred kilometres north of Darwin, English
phosphorescent pigments, and fluorescent pink and blue tones offset
settlers attempted to create a ‘new Singapore’ at the site in 1838. The
black expanses. The unconventional palette evokes uncanny fictions,
failed settlement was abandoned a decade later. As Armstrong read
transformation and magic. But where magic fades, rubble is left behind.
McKenna’s histories of crosscultural contact, he drew hundreds of
In the print Embedded, an abandoned chimney and a termite mound
pictures of the images that came to mind. Cut up, collaged and refined,
gesture at the British and Indigenous presence at Port Essington. The
he translated these drawings into the deeply evocative and nuanced
chimney, useless in the hot climate, lays in ruins on the grounds surface,
series of eleven linocuts Invisible stories: meditations on Port Essington.
while the termite mound runs deep into the earth below in harmony
The series is the first of his works acquired by the National Gallery and
with the land. Johanna McMahon, Curatorial Assistant, Gordon Darling
was purchased with funds generously donated by Lyn Williams AM.
Graduate Intern
Armstrong, who studied painting at the Victorian College of the Arts, has no formal training in printmaking. Refreshingly free from the technical restraints of correct print procedure, he describes printmaking as ‘an inventive, alchemical thing’. Instead of harnessing the clear distinctions of line and colour usually created by the sharp relief of the linoleum block, his prints move and bleed. Some areas are heavily inked, squelched onto overly wet paper, and others have only a wash of ink loosely applied. These inky seepages recall McKenna’s visceral descriptions of the settlers’ bodily experience of being ‘out of place’ in the stifling humidity of Australia’s tropical north.
Above: Benjamin Armstrong Leichhardt’s arrival and Embedded, from the series Invisible stories: meditations on Port Essington 2018, linocuts, with additions in coloured pigment, iridescent and phosphorescent pigments. Purchased with the assistance of Lyn Williams AM 2019
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now consigning AUCTION • 27 NOVEMBER 2019 • MElBOURNE important australian + international fine art for appraisals please contact MeLBOurne • 03 9865 6333 SyDney • 02 9287 0600 info@deutscherandhackett.com www.deutscherandhackett.com
DEL KATHRYN BARTON From her nest in the Holm-Oak tree the nightingale heard him, 2011 SOLD: $280,600 (inc. BP) Melbourne, June 2018 © Del Kathryn Barton
National Gallery of Australia
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