Slide Show
Art Reviews
Brett Whiteley was one of Sydney’s most accomplished sons. Whiteley was born in 1939 and his artistic trajectory was astonishing. Whiteley won his first art prize at the age of seven at the 1946 RSPCA competition in Sydney and ten years later he won the Young Painters’ Section Prize...
…Bessie Davidson [gives] in her still lifes, her interiors, indeed in her landscapes the full expression of her rich palette and of that full-blooded craftsmanship which generously encompasses l’essential in a harmonious whole.
...
My vision of landscape… has to do with it being nothing more than a backdrop for theatre, a stage set for human drama – travel, dreams, disaster.1
By the time Sidney Nolan died in London in 1992 the art world of Australia and abroad had long been splintered over the extent of his genius. Time is already helping to clarify his achievement, but back then it seemed impossible to compress it into a defining idea the way we can now...
Observing the progress of William Robinson’s art is like operating the zoom function on a camera; but in reverse. From his earliest demure interiors and the studies of domestic life in the Robinson household, his vision and his focus expand gradually, over time, to take in the views...
When a painting exceeds its estimate it's always a good thing, and when it breaks a record it’s a very good feeling for the auctioneers as well. I can’t remember a painting that caused such universal pleasure as My Armchair, by Brett Whiteley. The vendor was pleased,...
Lot 102. Sali Herman Street Scene, Sydney 1949
It’s hard to put your finger on Sali Herman’s place in the current Australian art market. During the 1980’s art boom he prospered and set a price record for his work of $77,000 (buyer’s premium inclusive). This was not beaten until...
Whiteley’s My Armchair, a major painting from 1976, bears the inscription in the upper right corner: Astral Weeks, a reference to the title of a famous album produced by the Irish singer Van Morrison in 1968.
Ethel Spowers, a painter and printmaker, was a pivotal figure during one of the most iconic and stylistically rich movements in the history of Australian art. Notable for the extraordinary output of female artists, including Margaret Preston, Dorrit Black, Eveline Syme and Thea...
