The subject of Jeffrey Smart’s Study for The Discussion is typically ambiguous: a discussion may be a dispute, argument, conversation or conference. The painting can be several things too: is it a figure group, a contemporary landscape, or a commentary on contemporary art? Is it...
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Art Reviews
By Corinna Cullen BA MA Art History and Curatorial Studies
21 Oct 2020
…‘I have always found paradox and contradiction to hold a lot of truth and comfort for me.’
Del Kathryn Barton1
By Marina Brennan, BA (Hons)
21 Oct 2020
Throughout his extraordinary career, Tim Storrier’s most memorable and distinctive motif has unquestionably been that of fire. Fire’s strength as a symbol is drawn in part from its ability to hold dual, if not contradictory, meanings. As we have seen during the horrific bushfires of last Summer...
By Anonymous
21 Oct 2020
Over the last sixty years, John Olsen’s art has become synonymous with the unruly beauty of the Australian landscape. Embracing both figuration and abstraction, Olsen’s highly lyrical paintings are instantly recognisable, merging land, sky and water into a vivid sensation borne from a very...
By Asta Cameron
21 Oct 2020
Peter Booth is one of Australia’s most prominent and exciting artists of the late twentieth century.
By Anonymous
21 Oct 2020
‘I have always looked forward to my first visit to this country, but now there is the added satisfaction for me that I am able to meet my Australian people as their Queen … I am proud indeed to be at the head of a nation that has achieved so much. Standing at last on Australian soil, on this...
By Gavin Fry
21 Oct 2020
One can imagine Sir Sidney Nolan, late in his career, reflecting with a wry smile and a sense of wonder as to how he had achieved the career and recognition sought by so many, but achieved by so few. The most famous, decorated and esteemed Australian artist of the century, comfortably ensconced...
By Marguerite Brown MA ArtCur
21 Oct 2020
In this painting Arthur Boyd introduces one of his most potent archetypes into the still, sparse space of a Wimmera landscape.
By Marguerite Brown MA ArtCur
21 Oct 2020
Arguably the two greatest Australian painters of the second half of the twentieth century are united in this work by Sidney Nolan, in which he depicts fellow artist and lifelong friend Arthur Boyd (1920-1999).
By Caroline Jones BA, MA (Art Admin.)
21 Oct 2020
Bruce Armstrong is one of Australia’s most celebrated contemporary sculptors: his large-scale public works of art dominate Melbourne’s cityscape. Armstrong’s best-known work would undoubtedly be Bunjil, the seven-storey high, 25-tonne eagle that towers over the Docklands precinct. This much-...
