14 July – 16 October 2006 artonview o art n v i ew

ISSUE No.46 ISSUE ISSUE w in t e r o.46 winter 2006 winter N o.46 2006 NA 2006 T IONAL GALLE R Y OF Y AUS TR ALIA

imants tillers • michael riley • James Rosenquist 9 – 30 August Wednesdays 6pm SPECIAL MEMBERS’ VIEWING This annual lecture series showcases the latest work of renowned Australian architects. 9 August Andrew Andersons from Peddle, Thorpe and Walker, Sydney 16 August Luigi Rosselli, Sydney 23 August Tim Jackson from Jackson Clements Burrows, Melbourne 30 August Shaun Lockyer from Arkhefield, Brisbane $60 Series; $50 members/RAIA/concession $20 Single; $15 members/RAIA/concession Presented in association with the ACT Chapter RAIA Sponsored by BCA Solutions Bookings essential James O Fairfax Theatre National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Mr Ron Radford AM, Director National Gallery of Australia

requests the pleasure of your company at a Members Viewing of

Saturday 15 July 2006 6pm The evening will commence with an introduction to the exhibitions

in the James O Fairfax Theatre by

Dr Deborah Hart, Senior Curator, Australian Paintings and Sculpture and Brenda L Croft, Senior Curator, Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art

Followed by a viewing of the exhibitions

Members /guests $40 Light refreshments Limited tickets – bookings essential RSVP 5 July 2006 (acceptances only) Phone 02 6240 6528

Imants Tillers The hyperborean and the speluncar 1986 oilstick, oil and synthetic polymer paint on 130 canvasboards Cruthers collection, Perth Michael Riley Untitled, from the series Cloud [feather] taken 2000 printed 2005 pigment prints, ultrachrome chromogenic inks on Ilford Gallery Pearl photographic paper Purchased 2005 National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Reproduced courtesy of the Michael Riley Foundation and VISCOPY, Australia Photo: John Gollings Richmond House, Jackson Clements Burrows contents artonview

Publisher 2 Director’s foreword National Gallery of Australia nga.gov.au 4 Interview with Rupert Myer, Chairman of the National Gallery Editor of Australia Council Alistair McGhie

Designer 6 Imants Tillers: one world many visions Sarah Robinson

Photography 14 Imants Tillers discusses Terra incognita & Terra negata Eleni Kypridis Barry Le Lievre Brenton McGeachie 16 Michael Riley: sights unseen Steve Nebauer

Designed and produced 21 Michael Riley Kristina 1986 in Australia by the National Gallery of Australia 24 Rosenquist: Welcome to the water planet Printed in Australia by Pirion Printers, Canberra 32 Right here right now: Recent Aboriginal and Torres Strait artonview i s s n 1323-4552 Islander acquisitions Published quarterly: Issue no. 46, Winter 2006 38 New acquisitions © National Gallery of Australia

Print Post Approved 46 The Anton Bruehl Gift pp255003/00078

All rights reserved. Reproduction without 50 Come rain or shine permission is strictly prohibited. The opinions expressed in artonview are not necessarily those of the editor or 52 Indian art: New acquisitions, directions and display publisher.

Submissions and correspondence 56 Conservation: The Mermaid’s Tale should be addressed to: The editor, artonview 58 Faces in view National Gallery of Australia GPO Box 1150 Canberra ACT 2601 60 Collection study room [email protected]

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front cover: Michael Riley Darrell (detail) 1989 gelatin silver photograph National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Reproduced courtesy of the Michael Riley Foundation and VISCOPY, Australia back cover: Imants Tillers installing Terra incognita 2005 at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra 2005 director’s foreword

Following on from the success of Crescent Moon and Constable, for the winter season at the Gallery we present three significant single-artist shows: Imants Tillers: One world many visions; Michael Riley: Sights unseen; and the paper works by American artist James Rosenquist, Welcome to the water planet. Again, it is felicitous to present the work of Riley and Tillers concurrently as these two Australian artists have made such significant contributions to the landscape and dialogue of art in this country. Michael Riley (1960–2004) through photography, film and video has challenged our perceptions of Indigenous Australia, and Imants Tillers in his continuing, numbered canvasboard panel works investigates the themes of identity and displacement, origins and originality, and language and landscape. I commend these two highly interesting exhibitions of contemporary Australian art to you. Ron Radford with From my office window, Lake Burley Griffin is looking On display in the Orde Poynton Gallery is the internationally renowned American artist James Turrell more like Constable’s Stormy sea, Brighton 20 July 1828 monumental paper work series Welcome to the water which puts me in no doubt that three frosty yet clear-skied planet and two related works by James Rosenquist months of winter lie ahead of us and that there are only produced with printer publisher Ken Tyler from September two weeks left to see Constable: Impressions of land, sea 1988 to December 1989. When you see this exhibition I’m and sky here in Canberra before it heads across the pond to sure Rosenquist’s journey from billboard painter in the 50s the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in – dare I to key figure in America’s Pop Art movement in the 60s will say it – windy Wellington. be apparent in the scale and subject of the works. Massive, Often, once exhibitions are up and have been on display impressive and a further demonstration of the depth of the for a while, connections between them become more National Gallery’s premier American print collection. apparent than may have been anticipated at their inception Our other current collection-based exhibition in the or planning. The concurrent displays over the past months Project Gallery, Right here right now, displays for the of Crescent Moon: Islamic art and civilisation in Southeast first time more than 80 new acquisitions to the Gallery’s Asia and Constable: Impressions of land, sea and sky Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Collection purchased – although from historically and culturally disparate sources over the past two years. These largely contemporary works, – had indisputable connections. Constable showed not only including canvas paintings, bark painting, fibre works, the work of the master of the English landscape tradition, prints, drawings, and sculpture covering themes ranging but also reminded us of many Australian landscapes and from the ancestral and ancient to politics and contemporary his influence on so many Australian artists from the 19th Australian society, fully demonstrate the great diversity and century to today, as demonstrated by the accompanying vitality of Indigenous Australian art and culture. exhibition Constable and Australia. In Crescent Moon we The lower level Asian Galleries will be closed over the witnessed the influence not of a single artist but of Islam in winter months for re-slating and de-cladding in order to Southeast Asia from the 14th through to the 19th century restore this very large space to its original function as a and its effect on the development of the cultural history of sculpture gallery featuring the iconic Brancusi Birds in Space. our region and our nearest neighbours. Both exhibitions By the end of August, we will have opened our new Indian have been extremely popular, well exceeding targets. I’d like and South Asian Gallery on the entrance level. This special to express my thanks to the Gallery’s Voluntary Guides for Indian Gallery will be the first of its kind in Australia. By their preparation and hard work and for being available to the end of September we will also have opened a larger show the many thousands of visitors through these highly Southeast Asian Gallery adjoining the Indian Gallery. popular exhibitions over the past three months. We are acquiring many major works for these new Asian displays, which will be revealed at the opening. The new

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complex and integrated displays in these Asian Galleries on Donations the principal level of the Gallery will be a significant step Belinda Barrett towards our stated aim of helping to place the art of our Sheila Bignell region centre stage in the National Gallery of Australia. Peter Farrell AM Major new Australian acquisitions, both 19th and 20th Andrew Gwinnett century, will also be revealed this winter. For instance, we Robyn Jenkins take great pleasure in presenting Sydney Long’s Flamingoes Judith Roach c. 1906 as the Masterpieces for the Nation acquisition. Rotary Belconnen This is a strikingly decorative oil painting by the leading John Schaeffer AO proponent of the art nouveau movement in Australia at Gene Sherman the turn of the 19th century. Further information on both Kerry Stokes AO Long’s work and the appeal is enclosed in this edition of Bruce and Daphne Topfer artonview. Masterpieces for the Nation is the National Foundations Gallery of Australia Foundation’s annual appeal to raise Gordon Darling Foundation funds to acquire a major work that will become part of Wolfensohn Foundation our permanent display. Over the past two years this appeal has been extraordinarily successful and has enabled the Gifts Gallery to acquire two significant Australian paintings: WC Aranday Foundation Piguenit’s Near Liverpool, New South Wales (purchased with Josephine Bayliss funds raised from the 2005 appeal) and William Robinson’s Anton Bruehl Jr Creation landscape – fountains of the earth (purchased Ann Burge with funds raised from the 2004 appeal). Please consider Carolyn Cameron being a part of this exciting initiative to assist in building the Michael Chaney AO National Collection for the enjoyment of future generations. Janet Dawson and Michael Boddy I hope you had a chance to participate in the Gallery’s Eleanor Hart autumn events such as the James Turrell lecture, the Bridget McDonnell Gallery Constable symposium, the Crescent Moon cultural day, Lila McGrath Sculpture Garden Sunday, or the innovative Forecast: art Ron Radford AM William Robinson and fashion collaboration between CIT fashion designers, Kenneth Tyler and Marabeth Tyler the Quantum Leap Youth Choreographic Ensemble, video Sanong Wattanaurangkul artists, Next Hair hairdressers and makeup artists from the Canberra Makeup Academy. The winter calendar of events Grants provides more outstanding opportunities for you to engage Australia Council for the Arts with artists, curators and educators, through special events Australia-Malaysia Institute developed in conjunction with our exhibitions and around Australia Indonesia Institute the National Collection. Visions of Australia There is much that is new and exciting to see and hear at the National Gallery of Australia this winter. Sponsors Casella Wines Hyatt Hotel

Ron Radford Director

artonview winter 2006 3 Interview with Rupert Myer, Chairman of the National Gallery of Australia Council Alistair McGhie

In 2001 the government asked you to chair an with creative processes and certainly creative individuals. independent inquiry into the visual arts in Australia. We need to count ourselves fortunate that we are able to What was a concern that arose for you regarding the see the end product and enjoy that. We are more likely to role of the visual arts or artists in our society? recognise an artist by their work than if they walked past us The Inquiry considered many issues about the circumstances in the street but I’m sure that there are many that would like of artists and the institutional context in which they work. some more personal recognition than they get. The status of the artist in Australia is still a very relevant consideration as visual artists don’t enjoy the same visibility If artists did receive more exposure would we then be as other artists. By and large, it’s a solitary profession and able to relate better to the final product? there is no equivalent to an audience’s applause at the One observation that I’d make from a personal collector’s end of the creation of a piece of work. Interaction with perspective is that it certainly adds enormously to the an audience has a very different character to it than the experience of collecting to know something about the interaction that performing artists have with their audience. person and to have met and discussed the work with the There are financial risks that have to be taken by artist. Discourse is a really important part of collecting and performing arts companies that relate to the magnitude the opportunity for the artist, having produced the work, to of the task and the need to bring collaborative efforts then participate in some discussion about what it is and the together into performances. There is a very different funding ideas and to also be part of feedback and response actually model for a visual artist’s practice and the financial risks is really valuable for the audience and the arts community. that are undertaken are on an individual level. Prior to the Inquiry, many in the sector had sought an examination of What’s your view on the best balance between popular the circumstances in which artists were finding themselves exhibitions aimed at generating attendance and more and, more broadly, the institutions around the country that speculative shows? supported their practice. The Gallery has a responsibility to have a decent balance of The model of support for contemporary arts practice exhibitions, some of which are going to be more speculative through government funding, as undertaken by the three and less popular and others that are going to generate large levels of government in Australia, is widely accepted audiences that enjoy coming to galleries for those sorts of internationally. That model is often under-recognised and we exhibitions, and indeed look forward to them. On the more don’t often see it portrayed as a necessary part of a creative speculative ones I think that is actually one of the assertive society. The arts are given limited media coverage and are roles that this institution can take. The Director’s recent regularly presented as an elitist activity, with the term elitist Vision Statement envisages the Gallery as an assertive, having implied derogatory connotations. Yet we have the relevant, national cultural institution that might pursue a common experience here of rushing off at weekends to pay curatorial idea or a view about an individual or a group of a lot of money to watch elite sports men and women whose artists whose work may not be so well known. And, yes, elite status is celebrated. The difference is that elite sports we should try and get sponsorship for that and, yes, we men and women now pull in six and seven figure salaries should try to be financially responsible about putting them whereas elite artists don’t. on, but we should be able to balance an overall exhibition program that allows us to do that and at the same time have So the media play a role in this? extremely popular shows. Interestingly some exhibitions that Many people can imagine what it might be like to be a you’d expect might not be popular become popular, and in sportsperson. I don’t think it’s easy for people to imagine that sense it’s sometimes hard to know what drives audience what it must be like to be an artist. While exposure to numbers. There are often surprises about what will draw and involvement in the arts by Australians at a young age people to the Gallery. is perhaps more limited compared to sport, the media contribute to this by not attempting to explore the ‘artistic How do you know the Gallery’s Council is doing a life’ with the same urgency of inquiry as they choose to good job? explore the ‘sporting life’. Many artists wouldn’t be prepared One of the measures is a collaborative collegial working to share with a wider audience what it is that they do and environment – but not so collegial that if someone wants to how they do it, nor to share with audiences the lives that say something discordant that they feel uncomfortable in they lead. So it’s not surprising in a way that we remain doing so. Another is the way in which the Council manages unexposed to creative lives. There is a mystery associated two very important relationships: one with the Director

4 national gallery of australia who has a critical role to play in the success of the Gallery; a responsibility to service the national capital well, but Director, Ron Radford and and the other with the Commonwealth Government. the idea of a national gallery extends beyond the national Chairman, Rupert Myer in front of a set of late The government appoints the Council so part of the role capital. It is both a place and an idea. The ‘place’ aspect is 19th-century ornamented is representing the institution back to the government obvious: it’s everything that happens here, it’s the building doors before the official opening of Crescent Moon: particularly in matters of recurrent funding, building and the collections, the programs and the staff. In fact, you Islamic art and civilisation in programs and other policy issues. We spend quite a lot of can’t make a comment on this institution without talking Southeast Asia time at the meetings reviewing the operational reports and about the outstanding staff. The ‘idea’ aspect is sometimes the broader strategy issues, the financial circumstances of less obvious. I’d really like to think that it will become a the institution, the process of the Acquisition Committee and more assertive national cultural institution where what adding to the Gallery’s collection. We also work on reviewing actually happens at the National Gallery really matters in exhibition schedules, the role of development, sponsorship a broader cultural sense. In order to achieve this, it means and benefaction. Many of these have long term horizons and lending works from the collection, including the touring outcomes may not be known for many years. of important parts of the permanent collection, like some of the Old Masters. We recognise any such works will be At the end of your time as Chairman what would you missed by those who live in Canberra, but what we’re doing like to have achieved? is creating an opportunity for those works to be seen in the I’d like to have the institution really celebrate its 25th context of other collections. That is something that adds anniversary because it will have many achievements of enormously to the appreciation of those objects within the which it can be proud. It’s unusual to think that it’s not broader context of all of the collections around the nation. yet 25 years old. It is the only Australian gallery of its type The Gallery has had a long association with a number created in the last century. It is worthy of celebration. I’d of very generous benefactors in the past and we should like also to think that we’ll be completing or have opened be continuing to find ways to honour that benefaction the new Indigenous Galleries with the new entrance and and create an environment where further acts of have completed the reconfiguration of the gallery spaces benefaction will occur. One of the obvious areas is in the with the new presentation of Australian art. I’d also like to continued development of the collection through strategic think that any visitor to the Gallery as a matter of course will acquisitions. The NGA’s own acquisition funds require visit the Sculpture Garden and that it becomes an integral additional benefaction so that we can continue to acquire and integrated part of the experience. We are a national the major works necessary as envisaged in the Director’s institution derived from an Act of Parliament so we have recent Vision Statement. a

artonview winter 2006 5 exhibitions galleries

Imants Tillers: one world many visions

14 July – 16 October 2006

Imants Tillers and Jennifer Introduction: one and many Slatyer installing Terra incognita 2 0 0 5 Imants Tillers is one of Australia’s most acclaimed National Gallery of Australia, contemporary artists, who established a national and Canberra 2005 photograph: Patrice Riboust international reputation in the early 1980s. This survey

Diaspora 1992 exhibition will provide the opportunity to trace the high oilstick, gouache and points of Tillers’ artistic development over more than synthetic polymer paint on 228 canvasboards two decades. The exhibition includes paintings shown in Museum of New Zealand the Venice Biennale in 1986 when Tillers was selected to Te Papa Tongarewa represent Australia along with other key works from the Izkliede 1994 oilstick, gouache and 1980s, through to the remarkable Diaspora series of the synthetic polymer paint on 1990s, to evocative works such as the Nature speaks series 292 canvasboards Gene and Brian Sherman Collection, 1998–2006 and a major new work Terra incognita 2005. Sydney Courtesy of Sherman Galleries The works have been carefully selected to convey

Paradiso 1994 Tillers’ personal approach in his particular artistic oilstick, gouache and processes and his ongoing interest in issues of identity synthetic polymer paint on has developed for his art. Since 1981 this has involved 299 canvasboards and displacement. The presence and absence of self is at working on small amateur painters’ canvasboards that The Chartwell Collection, the heart of Tillers’ work. It is bound up with concerns Hamilton, New Zealand come together in grid-like structures to form a work. about origins and originality that are implicit in his Farewell to reason 1996 A single work can contain anywhere from three to 300 oilstick, gouache and quotation of images from reproductions of artworks and panels. This method has provided a way for Tillers to synthetic polymer paint on other sources and the re-working of them. While issues 292 canvasboards work in relatively small studios and still create large National Gallery of Australia, of authorship may be challenging, an Imants Tillers paintings, even though he has often not been able Canberra work is easily recognisable. The personal aspects of his to view an entire work until it is exhibited in a larger approach reside in his distinctive canvasboard system gallery space. After coming up with the initial idea and and in the specificity of his choices – be they visual, creating a working ‘map’ as a guide, the making of a intellectual or intuitive. The personal aspects appear painting is quite intimate; the artist sitting at his studio in correspondences he discovers between the sources desk to work on individual panels which subsequently and his own experience; in unexpected juxtapositions get placed on the floor as one layer after another is left to form new realities; in the sensuous, layered surfaces to dry. The process of work evolving from table to floor and subtleties of tone and luminous colour; in the is performative, mirroring the subsequent installation of transformations and presence of the art. the work on the wall as one panel is applied after the Tillers has written that the life of an artist is next. After being shown on the wall (held on by Velcro essentially a solitary one. Yet the world he inhabits in tabs), the canvasboards come apart again, stacked in the work itself is connected with a rich repository of beacon-like formations that have a sculptural presence. ideas and imagery. The idea of one and many, of the In some instances the stacks have become works in their unit and the multiple, of an interconnecting web-like own right, like his recent installation Art is an action whole, relates to the remarkable system that Tillers 2006 in the exhibition.

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Conversations across time The hyperborean and the Tillers’ painting The hyperborean and the speluncar 1986, of the drapery that wrap around her body and billow speluncar 1986 oilstick, oil and synthetic polymer with its visual and poetic resonances of the sea, the wind above her head. In the more direct quotation of the de paint on 130 canvasboards and the cave, was the perfect work to show at the Venice Chirico image, classical references to houses, temples and Cruthers collection, Perth Biennale. Hyperborean refers to Greek mythology and the acropolises are treated in the manner of the 16th-century people who lived in a land beyond Boreas, the north wind; artist Giuseppe Arcimboldo inhabiting the horse’s head that speluncar refers to one who explores caves. The dominant has become the mysterious, symbolic bearer of the past. sources are de Chirico’s The mysterious animal 1975 and In the spectrum of Tillers’ work de Chirico has been a a painting by the 19th-century British artist, Frederick continuing source of fascination. Since the 1970s he has Leighton, Greek girls picking up pebbles by the sea 1871. been drawn to de Chirico’s interest in the metaphysical In his work Tillers establishes a meeting place for artists of and apparently coincidental occurrences across time and different time-frames and stylistic approaches who adopted place. A quite personal connection with this artist is found a similar approach to his own. In both instances these in Tillers’ work Inherited absolute 1992, based on de artists borrowed from classical Greek sources and adapted Chirico’s The painter’s family 1926. The work incorporates them to their own ends. a reference to a drawing by his first-born daughter Tillers has in turn edited the Leighton image for his Isidore as a child. In the re-making of the work Tillers re- own ends, extracting a single figure from the group of traced the formation of the letters of a child learning to women, while still locating her on a beach. In keeping with write – learning, tentatively, how each letter is shaped the sensuality of the original, the woman is like a figure – observing his offspring’s early interest in numbers and on a classical Greek vase: poised in her tender gesture repetition. Isidore Tillers recalls that as a child she often of collecting, invested with a sense of drama in the folds spent time with her father in his studio, like her younger

8 national gallery of australia sister Saskia later on, she often had a go at making her in addition to his normal schooling during the week. As Inherited absolute 1992 own canvasboard works. In Tillers’ adaptation of de much as he may have felt some ambivalence as he moved oilstick, gouache and synthetic polymer paint Chirico’s intimate family group, the added lines across the from his parental home into the wider world, at times on 115 canvasboards Orange Regional Gallery, surface suggest the passing of time. There is also a shared wanting to free himself from the shadows of a past he Gift of the Friends of the connection with the processes of making art (in references could only imagine, as a child of refugees he had a sense Orange Regional Gallery to the painter’s materials) and with architecture – in the of responsibility to his parents’ memories. figures that do not inhabit the buildings but are inhabited Tillers described his Diaspora series of the 1990s by them. In Tillers’ correspondence with de Chirico there is as introducing ‘a new paradigm’ in his work. The four always a shared fascination with serendipity and with the major paintings in the series collectively represent an epic idea of the past being alive in the present. statement relating to diasporas – to the dislocation of peoples from their original homelands (including within The Diaspora works their own lands due to colonisation) and the coming Although born in Australia, Tillers’ experience growing together of disparate cultures that is so much part of up as a child of Latvian refugees who migrated from a the stories and legacies of communities in the 20th and Displaced Persons camp in Germany in 1949, left him 21st centuries. Seen collectively the Diaspora works are, with a sense of fragmentation and an awareness of to quote Pierre Restany, like a vast ‘epigraphic fresco’ psychic exile. The feeling of his own ‘in-betweenness’ enfolding many visions.1 Taking into account the broad – belonging partly to two cultures and not fully to either sweep of the series from the first painting Diaspora 1992, – has informed his art and life. When he was growing up through Izkliede 1994 (Latvian for diaspora), to Paradiso in Sydney Tillers attended Latvian school on weekends 1994 (an anagram for diaspora), to Farewell to reason

artonview winter 2006 9 1996, the most striking change in Tillers’ art appears in the inspired by Georg Baselitz’s Oberon 1963–64 and re- way that he includes many small paintings nesting within inscribed with the word RIGA; the red and white reflecting each large work. Another distinctive element of these the colours of the Latvian flag. This segment refers in part paintings is that they include more text references than to the suppression of the Latvian language under Soviet previous works, locating language as a potent source of annexation and the loss of a public voice. identity: suppressed, fractured, regained and reworked as The title of the fourth work in the Diaspora series poetry, political activism, performance art, ritual and lament. Farewell to reason (p.7) 1996 comes from a book by Tillers’ monumental painting Diaspora 1992 came about Paul Feyerabend. The anchoring power of the work is in part as a response to dramatic political events. After the dignified presence of the Aboriginal man locating growing up with the view that the fate of Latvians was to be the centre of the work in Australia and suggesting the perpetually subsumed by a colonising culture or to go into displacement of indigenous peoples. The work also exile in Siberia, the newfound freedom of the Baltic States incorporates multiple voices and visions from other places that occurred with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 (New Zealand, France, Latvia, South America and Germany, seemed to Tillers to be remarkable, a sudden turnaround. to mention a few). There are numerous symbols relating to The first small painting that he included in Diaspora was mortality and ritual across different cultures including the a reference to The Madonna Oriflamma 1926 by Nicholas cross in Colin McCahon’s The five wounds of Christ no.3 Roerich, a Russian artist inspired by Tibetan mysticism, 1977–78 and another symmetrically placed cross on the theosophy and Russian icons. He was also the originator of vibrant green chasuble (a vestment worn at mass) originally the Roerich Peace Pact, signed by President Roosevelt and designed by Matisse for the chapel at Vence. The word other world leaders in 1935, that sought the preservation of ‘Nezinams’ refers to a tombstone for unknown Latvian cultural institutions around the world in times of war. The soldiers set amongst several other funerary images. flag held by the Madonna in the painting is The Banner of On the one hand patterns of rupture are present in Peace, the symbol of the Pact. In contrast, the trauma of large and intimate signs of remembrance. On the other shared memory is alluded to in the section containing four hand the cycles of nature are metaphors for regeneration: pale heads on long flexible necks probing space like radars, in allusions to rocks and clouds in McCahon, in the spiky

10 national gallery of australia yellow flowering details on the Matisse vestment, in the references including place names and excerpts of poetry Diaspora 1992 oilstick, gouache and synthetic unexpected inclusion of four superimposed panels of leaf and sensuous layered visual elements. polymer paint on 228 imagery based on photocopies of actual leaves that Tillers Drawing upon a poetic analogy of symbolist poets and canvasboards Museum of New Zealand made and repainted, and in a cut-out shape of a flowering artists, the title Nature speaks suggests that nature has its Te Papa Tongarewa, iris that is one of the first references to the German own voice or language. In particular Tillers was referring Wellington Romantic artist Philipp Otto Runge. In the epic picture of to the Latvian poet Ilze Kalnãre who wrote: ‘The rock Farewell to reason the Runge image is a modest inclusion. speaks, the mountain speaks, every ear of corn speaks, Yet his interest in this artist who found new ways of re- every tree and field, in a language so intimate and familiar.’2 conceptualising landscape through nature symbolism would The Nature speaks series comprises over one hundred flow in wave upon wave through the next phase of Tillers’ sixteen-panel works that contain multiple variations as art: in works such as the Nature speaks series 1998–2006. well as certain constants. As Tillers noted: ‘At first glance the series appears to proceed like an algorithm because of Nature speaks: when locality prevails the repetition of certain elements within each work – like By 1998 the groundwork was set for a dynamic the word “horizon”; the Mallarméan mantra “A throw of interweaving of two aspects of Tillers’ approach to the dice will never abolish chance”; the Tau cross of Colin painting: the web of interconnections between all things McCahon’s “load-bearing structures”; and the ubiquitous and an increasing recognition of the significance of cherubim of Philipp Otto Runge from his unfinished place. The shift in subject matter towards locality was Gesamtkunstwerk “The Times of Day”.’3 inseparable from the move Tillers made with his family In the Nature speaks series some works allude to Tillers’ to Cooma in late 1996 where he became inspired by the ongoing connection with a German Romantic tradition varied local environment: the garden at their family home as in Nature speaks (Kosciusko) and Nature speaks: D. Blairgowrie; the expansive terrain of the surrounding Both include a figure that closely resembles Caspar David Monaro region; and the proximity to the Snowy Mountains. Friedrich’s Wanderer above a misty sea c.1818. If Tillers Correspondences with landscape make their presence felt allows the cool romantic light of the Snowy Mountains in a non-literal way – as evocations of nature through text to envelop the dream-like atmosphere of Nature speaks

artonview winter 2006 11 Nature speaks: AU 2002 Nature speaks: AT 2002 Imants Tillers and Michael synthetic polymer paint, synthetic polymer paint, Jagamara Nelson gouache on 16 canvasboards, gouache on 16 canvasboards, Nature speaks: AD 2002 Private collection, Melbourne Canberra Museum and synthetic polymer paint, Gallery gouache on 16 canvasboards, Nature speaks: D 2000 Private collection, Brisbane synthetic polymer paint, Nature speaks (Kosciusko) gouache on 16 canvasboards, 1999 synthetic polymer Nature speaks: AQ 2001 Private collection paint, gouache on 16 synthetic polymer paint, canvasboards, gouache on 16 canvasboards, Private collection, Melbourne Australian National University, Canberra (Kosciusko), in Nature speaks: D he also reminds us that place was resonating in his art. As he wrote, ‘it was an Telepathic music 1994 synthetic polymer paint, painting is an illusion. The abstracted dot-screen over the exhilarating and panoramic experience that changed my gouache landscape suggests different ways of seeing and thinking perception of our vast and beautiful continent’.4 9 double-sided canvasboards 9 K brand music stands, about art, evoking constellations piercing the night sky. In Throughout the Nature speaks series, the mantra from randomly grouped Collection of the artist other works in the series there is an almost Dada sense of Mallarmé’s late daring poem Un coup de dés, ‘A THROW absurdity, as in Nature speaks: AU where the silhouette OF THE DICE WILL NEVER ABOLISH CHANCE’, inscribed in blue of a man on a bicycle perched on a weather vane over around the edges of the works is a continual reminder the horizon suggests the variability and strangeness of of the importance of chance correspondences that run existence as we try to navigate through the labyrinth of through all of his works. The exhibition Imants Tillers: one memory and contemporary experience. world many visions reveals that it is possible to engage In a series that reflects upon the significance of with multiple correspondences and transformations on a landscape Tillers felt that he could not overlook the power journey through different stages and aspects of the artist’s of much contemporary Aboriginal art. While Nature works from 1984 to the present. It opens up intriguing speaks: VI recalls the paintings of Emily Kam Ngwarray, possibilities for our engagement with a distinctive and works such as Nature speaks: AD are the result of intriguing approach to art-making in Tillers’ canvasboard collaborations with Michael Jagamara Nelson. In these system: in stacks on the ground; in an intimate installation works space is seen from above. In contrast to repeated of the boards on music stands titled Telepathic music references to the horizon, the alternative inscription 1994, in the fluctuating rhythms of the Nature speaks appears in a number of works: ‘There is no horizon’, series and in some of the largest and most accomplished conveying an alternative way of conceptualising place. paintings undertaken in Australia. a In Nature speaks: AT, Tillers locates us in the landscape Deborah Hart through glowing yellow tones and through place names Senior Curator, Australian Painting and Sculpture such as The ‘Jenny’ Brothers, Cooroo, Kybeyan and on to Myalla, Nimmitabel and Gaerloch in the region around notes 1 Pierre Restany in Diaspora in context: connections in a fragmented Tillers’ home. With the additional inscription of ‘out)back’ world, Pori Art Museum, Finland, 1995, p. 73 2 Imants Tillers, ‘When locality prevails’, Heat 8, new series, ed. Ivor in this work we are reminded of a journey that he made Indyk, Giramondo Publishing Company, Artarmon NSW, p. 115 into the interior of Australia in 2000 (also recalled in Nature 3 Imants Tillers, ‘When locality prevails’, Heat 8, new series, p. 114 4 Imants Tillers quoted in Ashley Crawford, ‘Centre grounds Tillers’, speaks: BK 2004). The experience was an enlivening one The Age, sighted in the following website on 5 December 2005: for him, coming at a time when his deepening feeling for www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/12/05

artonview winter 2006 13 Imants Tillers discusses Terra incognita & Terra negata

Terra incognita 2 0 0 5 As Heiner Bastian has pointed out, Mallarmé wanted works: Prophecy 1989 and Mystic America 1989 which synthetic polymer paint and gouache on 288 to write poetry similar in concept to the composition of I exhibited in my fourth and last solo exhibition at the canvasboards a painting: ‘Painting – not the thing, but the effect it Bess Cutler Gallery in New York in 1989. (Bess was Collection of the artist creates. Verse should not be composed of words, but disappointed that neither work contained the name of of intentions, and should destroy all words for the sake her birthplace: Saskatchewan.) of sensation.’ Thus the meaning of a poem can only be Subsequently I experimented with the map of evoked by an inner reflection of the words themselves. Australia but found its contour too distinctive and its In my own works, particularly over the last decade, subdivisions too few and too plain. It was only with the words, phrases and sentences (some of which come from discovery of David Horton’s Map of Aboriginal Australia at Mallarmé) float not on the white space of a page but the beginning of the new millennium that I found a way in and amongst the colours, the forms and the imagery to go forward on this front – for here was not only an of a painting. As in Mallarmé, they are not there to be alternative map to the familiar, boring one I had grown up decoded, to arrive at a precise meaning predetermined with at school but the 460 subdivisions demonstrated the by the author or the artist but rather to generate allusions rich diversity of the language/tribal/nation groups of the and sensations in the reader/viewer. Indigenous people of Australia – a fact which had been During the 1980s I was very fortunate to be making largely invisible or unknown to most white Australians frequent visits to New York and on several notable and the rest of the world. Here also, was the palpable occasions I found myself standing in front of one of lie to the misguided colonial idea of terra nullius – the Jasper Johns’ masterpieces: Map 1961 in the collection so-called empty, unoccupied continent of 1788. While of the Museum of Modern Art. What appealed to me the regional divisions on Horton’s map were panoramic, particularly was how the structure of the boundaries and diverse and fascinating (the Northwest, Southwest, names of the 52 states of the United States (together Desert, Spencer, Kimberley, North Arnhem, Fitzmaurice, sometimes with adjoining bits of Canada and Mexico) Gulf, West Cape, Torres Strait, East Cape, Rainforest, allowed Johns a new kind of freedom with his gestural Northeast, Eyre, Riverine, Southeast and Tasmania to brushstrokes. Here, by virtue of some novel constraints, name them all), it was the individual names themselves the Abstract Expressionism of de Kooning was given that most attracted me. I recognised words like Ngarigo, a new twist, a new life and a new relevance. It is Arrernte, Luritja, Badjala, Wiradjuri, Adnyamathanha as perhaps not surprising, given my postmodern bent at a kind of eloquent readymade poetry that I would like to the time, that this work gave me the idea of doing my include in my future paintings. own series of Johns’ ‘maps’ (both the paintings and After about three years’ work on this project, I have the prints), a repainting and reconfiguring of his work completed two major paintings, both composed of 288 from an Antipodean viewpoint. I only completed two canvasboard panels and measuring 120” x 336” each:

14 national gallery of australia Terra incognita in March 2005 and Terra negata in Melbourne is a work to rival Blue Poles or indeed the best Terra negata 2005 (details) synthetic polymer paint November 2005. Terra incognita is of a golden hue and of American Abstract Expressionism be it Pollock or de and gouache on 288 described by my friend, the semiotician Anne Hénault, Kooning. Furthermore, her painting is a kind of psychic canvasboards Collection of the artist as being ‘syntactical’ while Terra negata is of a red and yet geographical mapping of the land and in this has Emily Kam Ngwarray bronze hue and described as being ‘paradigmatic’. In a strange and unexpected affinity with the Jasper Johns Big yam dreaming 1995 Terra incognita I have isolated just the Aboriginal names Map 1961 that once had me spellbound in New York. synthetic polymer paint on canvas National Gallery themselves (without their defining boundaries) from Thus both Terra incognita (shown for the first time of Victoria, Melbourne Presented through the Art Horton’s map and distributed them spatially across the in this exhibition) and Terra negata (selected for the Foundation of Victoria by painting so that they correspond approximately to their Sydney Biennale in 2006) are for me a kind of homage to Janet and Donald Holt and family, Governors, 1995 actual geographical locations within the continent of Indigenous Australia, a lament for the tragedies of all the Australia. In Terra negata the same names are arranged lost tribes, languages and cultures of Australia but also, in the form of an alphabetical list from A to Y, beginning simultaneously, a kind of honour roll for the spectacular with the name Alyawarre and ending with Yiman. The resurgence of their culture. This has been revealed to the background image in both works – the tangled network wider world largely through art and especially through the or web of lines derives from a famous painting by the medium of painting – an amazing phenomenon to which Aboriginal artist Emily Kam Ngwarray who appeared on all Australians have borne witness over the last 30 years. a the art scene like a cloudburst in the early 1990s. Her Big Imants Tillers yam dreaming 1995 in the National Gallery of Victoria in

artonview winter 2006 15 exhibitions galleries

Michael Riley: sights unseen 14 July – 16 October 2006

16 national gallery of australia Wiradjuri/Kamilaroi artist Michael Riley (1960– beauty, and his subjects possess a sense of dignity and All Michael Riley images reproduced courtesy of the 2004) was one of the most important Indigenous visual grace. The black-and-white portraits, with their sensitive Michael Riley Foundation and artists of the past two decades. His film and video work styling and ambient lighting, are the very opposite of the VISCOPY, Australia challenged our perceptions of Indigenous experience, gritty, socio-political documentary style that emanated Untitled from the series cloud particularly the experience of disenfranchised from the Black Power and Indigenous self-determination [cow] 2000 (detail) printed 2005 chromogenic pigment communities in rural and remote eastern Australia, movements of the 1970s and ‘80s, often taken by non- photograph National Gallery of Australia, Canberra which he brought to the forefront of international Indigenous photographers. Purchased 2005 contemporary art. Riley’s work gained increasing critical These sensitive informed portraits of families and Untitled from the series acclaim in the early 21st century, highlighted by his communities are the antithesis of the bleak photojournalist flyblown [galah] 1998 Epsom selection for the 2003 Istanbul Biennial. Riley has been studies of contemporary Aboriginal life in towns and ultrachrome ink on Ilford Gallerie Gloss photographic selected as one of eight artists who will be represented cities favoured by the media. There is an obvious warmth paper in the significant Australian Indigenous Art Commission between subject and photographer. It is evident that the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2005 at the new Musée du quai Branly, due to open in Paris photographer knew his subjects well and shared their Untitled from the series in June 2006. experiences. Throughout all Riley’s work is a sense of flyblown [gold cross] 1998 Riley’s work draws on both European and North exploration, of using the media of film and photography Epsom ultrachrome ink on Ilford Gallerie Gloss American traditions – as well as his Indigenous heritage to represent the diverse aspects of contemporary photographic paper in Australia. He studied film-making and photography Aboriginal life accurately and to get away from the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2005 and was concerned by the contradictions imposed by stereotype of the drunk in the streets or marching in European beliefs on the Indigenous people in Australia. protests, and not being involved in everyday life. His early photographs are imbued with an aesthetic

artonview winter 2006 17 Michael Riley was born in Dubbo, western New South as the series flyblown, 1998 and the video Empire, 1997. Wales, and spent his early childhood on Talbragar Riley’s images reflect what he has described as the Aboriginal Reserve outside Dubbo, moving to Sydney ‘sacrifices Aboriginal people made to be Christian’. in 1976. He was represented in the first Indigenous They resonate with loss – experienced not only by the photographic exhibition, the NADOC ‘86 Exhibition individual, but also by entire Indigenous communities of Aboriginal and Islander Photographers, held at the – loss of culture and land in an enforced or sometimes Aboriginal Artists Gallery in Sydney in September 1986. embraced exchange for Christianity. Biblical elements In 1987, with nine other Sydney-based Indigenous artists, abound in Sacrifice: the cross laid on the chest and he founded Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Co-operative, standing out sharp against the sky in an unseen cemetery; a seminal force in the contemporary Indigenous visual the shimmering skin of the fish is in stark contrast to the arts movement throughout the 1990s. A number of his parched earth; the oozing liquid in the dark palms of the films and photo-media work won major national and black Christ-like figure evoking his struggle on the cross; international awards. Riley’s work is also represented in and the granules of sugar, flour and coffee echoing the various major public and private collections throughout rations meted out to Aboriginal people on missions and Australia, and his early black-and-white photography is hinting at the struggles present-day communities face with highly sought after by collectors. the onslaught of drugs. His first conceptual body of work was the languidly In early 1998 Riley was diagnosed with renal failure beautiful series of 15 gelatin silver images comprising and this debilitating illness impacted on his professional Sacrifice 1993. It is in this series that the symbol of and personal life. Riley’s last and most significant body the cross – that most potent of Christian icons – first of work, cloud, 2001, shifted from terra firma to other appeared, looming large against a turbulent sky. Riley worldly locations, including the paranormal. A dream-like returned to the subject of Christianity in later work, such quality is evoked in the seductive, digitally manipulated

18 national gallery of australia images of the Magritte-like bovine seraph from the Untitled from the series Sacrifice [single fish, Mission as it floats in mid-air against a background of cracked earth] 1993 clouds; the flight of the boomerang (or barrgan/balgarrn gelatin silver photograph National Gallery of Australia, in Wiradjuri), which is echoed in the wings of the angel, its Canberra Purchased with the assistance of the KODAK back turned to the viewer, face averted; and again in the (Australasia) PTY LTD Fund splayed wings of the blackbird, the eaglehawk or crow, 1993 and in the crucifix-like span of the native Galang-galang, Untitled from the series or locusts’ wings. There is irony and wit in this image. cloud [angel with full wings], taken 2000, printed Michael Riley: sights unseen reveals the prolific 2005 pigmented prints, talents of a quiet observer. Riley’s video, film and ultrachrome chromogenic inks on Ilford Gallery Pearl photomedia works continue to have a profound effect photographic paper National Gallery of Australia, on contemporary representation and comprehension Canberra Purchased 2005 of Indigenous Australia. The exhibition draws together a comprehensive body of work, chronicling a period of intense cultural development and achievement. a

Brenda L Croft Senior Curator, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

artonview winter 2006 19 Michael Riley Darrell 1989 gelatin silver photograph National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Michael Riley Kristina 1986

In September 1986 Michael Riley’s moody Hollywood- traditional owner Vincent Lingiari, at Daguragu in the Kristina 1986 style glamour portrait of Kristina (Nehm), a Sydney- Northern Territory. The prints were mostly black and gelatin silver photograph printed 2001 based Black Australian woman, was used on the white and the content addressed a wide range of issues National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2005 invitation card for the opening of the NADOC ‘86 and notions of Aboriginality. Riley and Tracey Moffatt Image exhibited at the Exhibition of Aboriginal and Islander Photographers at presented staged portraits that turned upside down NADOC ‘86 Exhibition of Aboriginal and Islander the Aboriginal Artists Gallery in Clarence Street, Sydney. the stereotypes that inhibit the lives and futures of Photographers, Aboriginal The exhibition was part of NADOC ’86, the annual Indigenous people. For them identity involved issues of Artists Gallery, Sydney 1986 National Aboriginal Day of Commemoration programs – dress and undress and reduction would be dependent now known as NAIDOC Week (National Aboriginal and on inserting the unfamiliar dark face and body in the Islander Day Observance Committee). The 1986 NADOC familiar white scenario. Both Moffatt and Riley worked photographic exhibition included some 60 works by outside what they saw as constraints of ‘straight’ Riley and nine other Indigenous photographers: Mervyn photography preferring to stage their images and evoke Bishop, Brenda L. Croft, Tony Davis, Ellen José, Darren earlier types of stereotyped photographic images of Kemp, Tracey Moffatt, Chris Robinson, Terry Shewring Aboriginal people. Both would also later work in film. and Ros Sultan. The style and form varied from artist Photographs taken at the opening by Sydney to artist across portraiture, landscape, protest marches photographer William Yang show there were indeed and press photographs, including images by Bishop, the plenty of beautiful and chic Black women and men eldest of the group and then the only long-established present. It was in fact an historic event; the first professional who had made a famous 1975 Aboriginal exhibition ever held of contemporary art exclusively by land rights recognition image with then Prime Minister Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander photographers. It Gough Whitlam pouring soil in to the hands of Gurindji was an art opening like any other but that note of style

artonview winter 2006 21 and confidence in that inviting image set the tone of the accentuate the hung-over, I-cant-stand-the-light look of show and the future role of Indigenous photographers that genre. Anthony (Ace) Bourke, then Director of the in Australian and international art. Riley, Moffatt, Bishop, Aboriginal Artists Gallery, and co-curator of the show Croft and José in particular developed high profile with Moffatt, recalls the picture ‘was very political, black national and international careers over the next decade. girls weren’t meant to be seriously chic’. Looking again The NADOC ’86 show was preceded by Koori Art at the image, we can’t see her eyes and despite her ’84, the pioneering show of Indigenous urban-based small frown imparting a note of anxiety, Kristina oozes artists which had included several photographers confidence and spirit, no victim here, she flaunts her including Riley and Shewring. sunglasses as a fashionable, not functional artefact. Yet Of the photographers in the 1986 Aboriginal Artists no Australian fashion magazine then would have hired Gallery show the photographer and nascent film-maker a Black model despite the profile of Black singers and Tracey Moffatt, attracted the most media attention. She models overseas. showed a complex but coolly classic black and white The NADOC ’86 show marked the beginning of portraits of dancers from the Islander Dance company a public profile within the art world for contemporary called the Some Lads series and a now iconic colour Indigenous photographers. The National Gallery acquired portrait of dancer/actor David Gulpilil sprawled on a a 2001 print of Kristina 1986 and another portrait car bonnet at Bondi Beach with tinnie in hand, ghetto from slightly later, Darrell 1989 in 2005, the latter is blaster at his side and traditional white painted body very enigmatic with the young man’s soft-lit face, eyes markings. Regarding this image the artist made a rare lowered and closed, in a Zen-like meditation. At this categorical statement to the media: ‘Why shouldn’t time Riley had become a professional artist, he had Aboriginal people go to the beach like anyone else’. taken classes at the Tin Sheds in photography and was The point was lost on some. Moffatt was to receive quite working as Assistant to teacher Bruce Hart at Sydney a bit of flak for allegedly representing an Aboriginal College of the Arts. In the 1993 Riley would make his person as a drinker of alcohol in a public setting. Sacrifice series of overtly symbolic tableaux ramping up One of Riley’s first major works was prominent in the spiritual and multilayered readings of his work. the NADOC ’86 exhibition. This was the dark-toned An earlier generation of Australian non-Indigenous head and shoulders portrait of young woman wearing photographers in the seventies had imagined themselves a luminous white shell or bone necklace which was taking up a ‘new’ medium. For this first generation marked by an elegiac beauty and other-worldliness of highly directed Indigenous artist-photographers which would become the artist’s signature. It recalled, to begin meant inevitably that first there would be and at the same time overwrote, the well-known 19th- some backtracking. The medium had a history as an century photographs of Tasmanian Aboriginal woman accomplice to injustice which needed rewriting. Other Truganinni wearing the maireener shell necklace unique Indigenous photographers shows followed in the next to the Islander’s craft. After Truganinni’s death her shell five years aided by the establishment of other dedicated necklace and bracelet were acquired by the Royal Exeter venues such as Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Co-operative Museum in England and repatriated to Hobart in 1997, in 1987. New Indigenous photo-based artists and along with another maireener shell necklace held in curators appeared. Issues of dress and undress, which the South Australian Museum. Riley would have been are central to how the native is seen (and not seen), aware of the issues of violation of Trugannini’s body and remained topical for many. a repatriation of her remains from museums. The image Gael Newton also recalled a 19th-century image by German-born Senior Curator, Australian and International Photography photographer JW Lindt of a beautiful Grafton Aboriginal woman wearing a white bone necklace which was widely reproduced. Lindt made his name and fortune in the 1870s with sales of staged tableaux photographs taken in his Grafton studio of local Aboriginal people in ‘authentic’ ethnographic settings. Riley’s images of Kristina (with and without sunglasses) in the 1986 exhibition were selected from a number taken throughout the mid to late 1980s. The exhibition notice image shows Kristina in a languid pose leaning on her crossed arms. It seems ‘retro’, recalling 1930s images of Black American Blues singers hanging over the piano player. The sunglasses she wears

22 national gallery of australia Kristina (no glasses) 1984 gelatin silver photograph National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2005 Vintage print exhibited Koori Art ‘84, Artspace, Sydney orde poynton gallery

Rosenquist: Welcome to the water planet

10 June – 12 September 2006

‘All I have to be is brilliant’

James Rosenquist The American artist James Rosenquist was pleased he was North Dakota in 1933, he studied at the University represented by VAGA and now exhibiting with the prestigious New York Gallery, VISCOPY, Australia of Minnesota, supporting himself by painting Phillips Acquavella. ‘All I have to be now is brilliant’, he recently 66 Gasoline signs as he travelled to the border of the Sky hole 1989 33 colour pressed paper pulp mused in conversation. In his career the elusive ‘need to State of Iowa. Rosenquist then graduated to painting with lithographic collage be brilliant’ is something the artist has constantly searched billboards, including the billboards advertising Davy on white, handmade, hand- coloured, TGL paper and for. Sometimes it seemed he was successful, sometimes Crockett, ‘King of the Wild Frontier’, the film first released white, mould-made Rives BFK paper he wasn’t, and he could never quite work out why, other in 1954. He painted two versions of this up and down published by Tyler Graphics than it sold.1 Rosenquist has an unusual modus operandi the highways leading to Minneapolis. The following year Ltd Purchased with the assistance to achieve his goal, art historian Judith Goldman calls it a he left the Midwest for New York to pursue an artistic of the Orde Poynton Fund ‘taste for a convoluted idea’.2 He likes to draw together career, winning a scholarship to attend the Art Students 2002 visual elements or notions that fascinate or intrigue, which League in New York. There he continued painting he then places together to form a complex composition. billboards to support himself. His work now graced the With this process, whether the artist is brilliant or not can skyline of New York’s Times Square and Brooklyn and only be judged on completion. Rosenquist gained a certain notoriety when he was In the mid 1980s, when Rosenquist agreed to work at featured in an article published on 6 June 1960 and the print studio at Tyler Graphics Ltd at Mount Kisco, in dubbed, ‘Broadway’s biggest artist’. In this article, not New York State, he was required ‘to be brilliant’. The artist noted for its understatement, the overly enthusiastic UPI had been invited by Ken Tyler, printer and publisher, to journalist commented further that while ‘bigness isn’t explore the idea of making some paper pulp works. These always greatness, his creations nonetheless dwarf the came to form the series Welcome to the water planet most grandiose artistic accomplishments of Rivera and and the works House of fire and Time dust which were Michelangelo’.3 produced in 1988 and 1989. Rosenquist had been a long- By the 1960s, the experience of painting on a large time admirer of Tyler and his working methods. ‘Ken liked scale influenced his own art. Rosenquist began working to get his hands dirty’; he was ‘voracious’ in the studio on huge canvases and incorporating figures from the mass in his enthusiasm for new ideas about printmaking, new media. Because of their very size, the individual forms techniques, new materials. became abstracted when viewed close-up. The effect that Tyler’s approach was in stark contrast to Rosenquist’s scale changed figures from realistic images to abstract early experience in printmaking, when he made his first ones was something Rosenquist delighted in. lithographs in 1965 and 1966 with publisher Tatanya Rosenquist’s growing popularity as an artist had him Grosman at Universal Limited Art Editions, West Islip, regularly showing at Pop Art’s mecca, the Leo Castelli New York. He found the atmosphere of the studio ‘old Gallery in New York. The Castelli stable of artists included fashioned’ with more traditional technical methods used, Roy Lichtenstein, Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns leisurely lunches and no sense of urgency. and Andy Warhol. All were in some way associated with As a young man Rosenquist had long desired to Pop Art. This was a movement which evolved in the late become an artist. Born in provincial Grand Forks in 1950s, which embraced ideas, subjects and techniques of

24 national gallery of australia

Time dust 1992 popular culture. Pop saw the adoption of forms, colours larger scale, and a more inventive way of making art. In 82 colour pressed paper pulp, lithograph, screenprint, relief, and methods of mass culture drawn from advertising, contrast, he came to consider that prints were too small, etching, stamping and collage television, film, music, comics, pulp novels and magazines. too rigid in technique and lacked spontaneity. When, in printed from one copper plate, 59 aluminium plates, Rosenquist was one of the central artists who drew 1987, Tyler wrote to Rosenquist inviting him to work at his four magnesium plates and inspiration from such sources. However, unlike other Pop new purpose-built workshop at Mount Kisco in upstate 12 screens on seven sheets of white, handmade, hand- artists, Rosenquist’s art method of the convoluted idea New York, he needed to be convinced the experience coloured, TGL paper; white, mould-made Rives BFK paper; made his imagery not immediately clear. It was an art of would be worthwhile – that making paper works and black/gold marble Dri-Print fragments juxtaposed in often apparently bizarre, but at lithography with Tyler would be different from his earlier metalized foil published by Tyler Graphics Ltd the time oddly pleasing, sequences. experiences. In response, Tyler promised Rosenquist that he Purchased with the assistance Rosenquist’s association with Ken Tyler goes back would provide handmade paper as big as the artist could of the Orde Poynton Fund 2002 many years to the time when he was keen to be further imagine and then sent him sketches of his premises and involved in printmaking to reach a wider audience through equipment. By the next year, Rosenquist had agreed to using new media. The artist and printer had planned work at Tyler’s studio. to work at Gemini GEL in Los Angeles decades earlier. The new premises at Mount Kisco were established to However, as fate would have it, Rosenquist had a car further Tyler’s desire to provide the utmost assistance for accident in 1971 in which the artist, his wife and child artists who worked with him on print projects. In discussion were seriously injured and so nothing came of their first it became apparent that the intention was that Rosenquist attempt to work together in the early 1970s. In 1974 they and the printer would develop a project – perhaps to make met in Bedford New York when Tyler had moved to the some paper pulp works. Tyler had a long held an interest in east coast of the USA, but again nothing eventuated.4 The handmade papers. He had worked on collaboration in 1973– 1970s were a testing time for Rosenquist, both personally 74 with Robert Rauschenberg at the Richard de Bas paper and as an artist, and he said of these years that they were mill in France, where the artist made 12 paper works. Tyler ‘not a very good time in my art work at all’.5 then continued with paper pulp projects in the 1970s with As Rosenquist’s career advanced both as a painter and artists Elsworth Kelly, Keith Noland and later, in 1979, David maker of prints, his progress in each medium was decidedly Hockney. Hockney produced spectacular paper pulp works, uneven. In fact, the artist had become disillusioned with notably in his Paper Pools series, which brought paper works printmaking. He found painting more immediate, on a to new heights in terms of scale, colour and textures.

26 national gallery of australia When he arrived, Rosenquist had an idea, a convoluted new ideas, ‘with Ken – he’d look at you, walk away and one, which he hoped would develop as an image – slow the next day he would have devised something to make heating popcorn taking its time – and tying this notion the new idea work. Nothing would stop him … he would together with his growing concern about the state of go to any length … He would never say no.’ For the project planet earth – the only water planet known in existence Tyler devised a huge deckle box to make hand-made in the universe at this time. Arriving at the workshop, papers some 150 x 305 cm, and a giant printing press for Rosenquist had the same need ‘to be brilliant’. He mulled lithography and etching (305 x 610 cm). over such disparate thoughts. Telling Ken of his initial idea, Over the months as the pair worked together a series of Tyler joked, ‘Well, that was one idea, where are the rest large-scale paper pulp works evolved, using huge sheets of of your ideas?’. As an artist Rosenquist liked to work with handmade paper made on the TGL premises. The project fluid concepts initially for what became the Water planet was inspired by the exotic vegetation of Florida where his project, which would then take shape during his time at studio was in Aripeka on the Gulf of Mexico and reflected the Tyler studio: ‘So then we’re getting into this print called Rosenquist’s disquiet with what was happening to the The bird of paradise approaches the hot water planet. He earth. All this combined to project Rosenquist’s concern, says, “What’s the next idea?” So I brought them the next ‘We all live on the water planet’, the artist discussed at an idea. He says, “Oh great! That’s fabulous. Where’s the next interview, ‘John Glenn [the first American astronaut to orbit one?” I said, “I don’t have any idea yet”.’6 the earth] said when he went into space he turned around In fact, Rosenquist wished to remain as spontaneous and looked at Earth, and he wondered why so many people as he could, untrammelled by long-held or preconceived were spending so much money on blowing it up, and they ideas. ‘I wanted them to come right out of the air’.7 To actually lived on it. It seems very bizarre’.8 Rosenquist’s work in this manner required a print workshop which could series of paper works were intended to act both as a be innovative and on the spot. Rosenquist was pleased celebration and a warning to what might happen to the to be working with Tyler on such a momentous project water planet. because he considered him ‘probably the best printing Rosenquist included imagery which evoked the technician in the world’. Unlike other printers who, when colourful and sensual riches of the earth and brilliant faced with a difficult task put to them by the artist, would flora from Florida, set within a wondrous star-lit universe. shake their heads and say sorry they couldn’t deal with the This he combined with the contrasting ideas about the

artonviewartonview autumn winter 2006 27

in translating Rosenquist’s designs into paper form. The artist developed a group of templates which took a great deal of time to make, based on his drawings and cut for each form he wanted. Tyler drew on his own technical expertise and the constant desire for experimentation and innovation to solve problems in the workshop. For the large areas of graded colour, impossible to achieve using mould shapes, Tyler proposed to use a spray gun, used for applying stucco to walls in houses which could spray the gradations of brilliant and unusual colour across the pulp on which the lithographic elements were collaged. The technique was a success and the results were glorious with a look of apparent spontaneity and effortlessness, which belied the hours of preparation and a technique born of experimentation. Rosenquist was delighted with his paper pulp works. ‘The wonderful thing about paper pulp is the colour. If previous page: mistreatment and destruction of the earth represented Space dust 1989 you take a magnifying glass, you’ll see a little fuzz rising by detritus, pots and pans, rocket ships, fighter planes or 20 colour pressed paper like smoke off the surface of this handmade paper – like pulp with lithographic missiles of destruction with the addition of torpedos in collage doing giant watercolours and letting this watercolour seep on white, handmade, hand- the form of ruby red lipsticks or jet engines as acid green together at the perfect moment … ’10 a coloured, TGL paper and pencils. ‘The water planet is earth. A visitor from another white, mould-made Rives BFK paper universe comes by, and we say, “hey, welcome to this Jane Kinsman published by Tyler Graphics mess! It’s hell, it’s burning up, but come on in!”’9 Senior Curator, International Prints, Drawings and Ltd Illustrated Books Purchased with the The first idea Rosenquist came to form was The bird assistance of the Orde Poynton Fund 2002 of paradise approaches the hot water planet. From his notes 1 James Rosenquist in conversation with Jane Kinsman, 9 March 2006. early days as a billboard artist it was Rosenquist’s habit All quotes with text refer to this interview unless otherwise indicated. James Ronsenquist working 2 Judith Goldman, ‘Whenever you’re ready, let me know’, in James with Ken Tyler on Skull to work from a small drawing, often a collage of various Rosenquist: Welcome to the water planet and house of fire 1988– Snap, state I at Tyler images, and upscale the composition and develop this 1989, Mount Kisco, United States: Tyler Graphics Ltd, 1989, p. 13. For Graphics Ltd, 1989 to be a gargantuan size. Deconstructing the image into further reading see Constance W. Glenn, Complete Graphic Works 1962–1992, New York: Rizzoli, 1993, cat. nos. 214–23, Time dust, The bird of paradise its component parts, artist and printer decided to make illustrated, pp. 160–68. approaches the hot water 3 United Press International, 6 June 1960, quoted in Judith Goldman, planet 1989 the curved lines of cross-hatching, so characteristic of James Rosenquist, New York: Viking Penguin, 1985, p. 25. 33 colour pressed paper Rosenquist’s work in general at this time, and it would 4 Ken Tyler in correspondence with Jane Kinsman, 18 April 2006. pulp with lithographic 5 James Rosenquist referring to the years 1971 to 1977, quoted in collage on two sheets then be printed in colour lithography. These lithographic Constance W. Glenn, Time dust: James Rosenquist, Complete of white, handmade, hand- elements would then form a collage which would be Graphics: 1962–1992, New York: Rizzoli, 1993, p.51. coloured, TGL paper and 6 James Rosenquist in Welcome to the water planet (Documentary film) white, mould-made Rives laid for a brilliantly coloured paper pulp sheet. The (New York: Seven Hills Production, 1989) BFK paper 7 James Rosenquist (Documentary film) 1989 published by Tyler Graphics separate colours were made by filling different moulds 8 James Rosenquist (Documentary film) 1989 Ltd with paper pulp placed on top of the large sheets of 9 James Rosenquist quoted in Walter Hopps and Sarah Bancroft, James Purchased with the Rosenquist: A retrospective, New York: Guggenheim, c. 2003, pp. assistance of the Orde handmade paper which were cut out in metal according 126 –27. Poynton Fund 2002 to Rosenquist’s design. 10 James Rosenquist (Documentary film) 1989 At the initial stages of the project the method of using metal moulds, or ‘cookie cutters’, was clumsy, time- consuming, and the paper pulp lacked consistency – it was just ‘so awful’, Rosenquist remembered. The paper pulp was messy and not easy to control. Rosenquist was also frustrated by the lack of spontaneity in the whole procedure. He was loosing momentum. To counteract these problems, Tyler worked on the consistency of the pulp and the shapes of the moulds, but still there were problems

30 national gallery of australia

project gallery

Right here right now Recent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander acquisitions 13 May – 13 August 2006

inspiration from 18th-century portraiture filtered through 13 May – 13 August 2006 the artist’s 21st-century perspective. These works are shown alongside a stunning body of canvases by established and emerging Papunya Tula artists; paintings by emerging artist Ngoia Pollard Napaltjarri from Utopia in central Australia; Bidyadanga and Parnggurr communities in north-east Western Australia, and Peppimenarti in the Northern Territory; and superb lorrkon and larrikitj [hollow logs] by rising artists from Maningrida and Yirrkala, Timothy Wulanjbirr and Naminapu Maymuru-White, respectively, whose work has gained increasing notice in the past year. Tiwi artists Jean Baptist Apuatimi and Timothy Cook present their distinctive vision rendered in ochre. Works on paper by foremost Torres Strait Islander print-maker, Dennis Nona (Kala Lagaw Ya people), are Unknown Maker Right here right now: Recent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Rainforest people highlighted by the innovative approach to working with a Islander acquisitions presents a selection of works from Jawun basket [bicornual] diversity of media on paper by senior Arnhem Land artist 1900s lawyer cane across the breadth and depth of Indigenous visual art and National Gallery of Australia, Paddy Fordham Wainburranga (Rembarrnga people). Canberra Purchased 2005 culture in Australia over the past two centuries, acquired A whimsical approach is evident in the objects of during the last two years, which have not yet been on Julie Dowling south-eastern artist Lola Ryan, and Blackstone, Western Badimaya/Yamatji people public display. Media include bark painting, fibre-work and Laid in his tomb Australian artist Kantjupayi Benson (Ngaanyatjarra people), textiles, print-making, drawing, painting and sculpture, oil on canvas whose individual approaches to their work encompass National Gallery of Australia, with themes ranging from the ancestral and ancient in Canberra Purchased 2005 intimate and recent history. Other objects and textile Indigenous and European time, to the cutting edge of works include two rare late 19th-century bicornual baskets political society in Australia today. from Far North Queensland, a magnificent burial basket Works are by leading contemporary artists such as by renowned Ngarrindjeri weaver, Yvonne Koolmatrie, bark painter and lorrkon (hollow log) maker, Kuninjku textiles by local and regional artists, and a series of vibrant artist John Mawurndjul, whose work has been selected weavings by Maningrida artists. for the prestigious Australian Indigenous Art Commission Such contemporary works complement recent (AIAC) at the new Musée du quai Branly in Paris; a series acquisitions of historical works, which include a stunning of oils on canvas with a specifically Indigenous perspective 19th-century Torres Strait Islander mask by an unknown on Christianity by Julie Dowling (Yamatji/Badimaya maker; a wonderful carving of the wife of Gurrmirringu, people), the edgy satire of Waanyi/Waanjiminjin artist the ancestral hunter by David Malangi Daymirringu; a Gordon Hookey; to memento mori in the work of Kuku/ series of spectacular painted boards created in the early Erub artist Clinton Nain, in a stunning series of panels 1970s by Wadeye (Port Keats) artists; and paintings by by Ungkum artist Rosella Namok and a recent canvas by renowned Warmun artists, the late George Mung Mung renowned Waanyi artist Judy Watson, whose work is also and his contemporary, Hector Jandany, elder statesman in represented in the AIAC. the community today. a A group of paintings by emerging Kudjla/Gangalu artist Daniel Boyd, visually pun on the concepts of Brenda L Croft terra nullius, buccaneering and stolen wealth, drawing Senior Curator, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

32 national gallery of australia

Daniel Boyd Kudjla/Gangalu people Captain no beard oil on canvas National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2006 Dennis Nona Kala Lagaw Ya people Awai Yithuyil (Badu Island Story) relief National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2005

36 national gallery of australia Unknown Maker Torres Strait Islander people Mask wood, shell, resin, human hair, fibre string, white pigment National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2006

Doreen Reid Nakamarra Pintupi people, Nakamarra subsection Untitled synthetic polymer paint on canvas National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Purchased 2005 © Doreen Reid Nakamarra and Papunya Tula Artists

artonview winter 2006 37 new acquisition Australian Painting and Sculpture

Shane Cotton Three-quarter view

In recent years Shane Cotton has emerged as one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s most significant contemporary painters. Working within postmodern and post-colonial frameworks, Cotton combines appropriated imagery from Maori and pakeha (non-indigenous New Zealanders) sources to create hybrid, poetic paintings, which investigate the shared experience of the country’s two cultures. Three-quarter view is dominated by the moko (facial tattoo) of 19th-century British flax trader, Barnet Burns. The striking physical transformation of the Englishman resulted from his extraordinary decision to live amongst the Maori from the 1830s. Cotton used a 19th-century etching of Burns as his source, yet his painting process transforms the original. Removing all signs of Burns’ Englishness, the artist has reproduced only his moko in two-tone blues. Hovering around the disembodied face are targets, sparrows and a goldfinch. The avian motif has particular importance in Maori cosmology and the goldfinch symbolises the passion of Christ in western religious art. The captivating combination alludes to the complex relationship between Christianity, colonialism, and contemporary culture. Three-quarter view is the final painting in a series of three works based on historic etchings and photographs. Each work presents a portrait painted from a different angle: a frontal view, a profile view, and a three-quarter view. The first painting depicts the carved self-portrait of 19th-century Maori chief, Hongi Hika. Hika displayed great interest in Shane Cotton Three-quarter view 2005 European culture and travelled to England in 1820. The acrylic on canvas interrelation between the narratives of Hika and Burns is of purchased 2005 particular interest to Cotton: ‘it reflects ideas associated with gain and loss, which encircle racial and cultural exchange. Between the spaces of the frontal and profile view, is the three-quarter view; a space of difference: a space of change’ (‘Trans-former’, Keynote address, AAANZ conference, Power Institute, 2005). In this way, Three-quarter view creates a ‘liminal’ space in which colonial narratives are blurred and new cultural possibilities are engendered. Cotton’s art questions the notion of indivisible cultural identity, looking instead to the indeterminate space between Maori and pakeha perspectives.

Olivia Sophia Intern, Australian Painting and Sculpture, from the Australian National University

38 national gallery of australia new acquisition Australian Prints, Drawings and Illustrated Books

John Lewin Studies of a remora fish

In the early decades of the colony watercolour was one of history subjects, including the first known depiction of a John Lewin Studies of a remora fish the few media for recording Australia’s natural history and koala following an 1801 expedition to the Hunter River. c. 1807 landscape. One of the most successful artists of this period The most recent addition of Lewin’s work to the watercolour on paper was John Lewin, the first professional artist to reside in collection is his Studies of a remora fish c. 1807. This Australia as a free settler, who arrived in the fledgling watercolour shows two studies of a remora fish – one is a colony in January 1800. Trained by his ornithologist father full-length view from above and the other is the underside in England, Lewin was skilled in the art of natural history of the head. The fish is painted in a monotone grey painting. He rarely had the luxury of painting subjects of watercolour in delicate detail, with particular attention his choice, but readily accepted commissions from those given to the head and mouth and underside of the head. interested in the natural oddities of flora and fauna or There is no background to distract from this faithfully those who wanted ‘portraits’ of their houses as proof of rendered natural history study. The work is inscribed their success in this strange new land. The National Gallery across the top of the sheet “16 inches in length & 5 in holds several watercolours by Lewin and his Government Girth – Black on the Back with a Black Stripe on the side” House Parramatta. December 1806 is the earliest and “Under side of the Head” above the view of the watercolour painted in Australia in the collection. Lewin fish’s head. This work was originally in the collection of was fortunate to come under the successive patronage Governor William Bligh and was held by the family until of governors Hunter, King, Bligh and Macquarie, and recent times. accompanied field expeditions, documenting many natural Anne McDonald Curator, Australian Prints and Drawings

artonview winter 2006 39 new acquisition International Photography

Shinzo Fukuhara Beautiful West Lake: the light with its harmony

Shinzo Fukuhara Shinzo Fukuhara was the most prominent and influential essay ‘The Light with its harmony’ in which Fukuhara photogravure plate from Beautiful West Lake: the light amateur art photographer in Japan between the world promoted a manifesto for photographic art reflecting with its harmony Tokyo: wars and the driving force behind various camera societies, national character (Japaneseness) based on the abstract Nihon Sashin-kai [Japan Photographic Society] 1931 exhibitions and publications. He was very western in qualities of light merged with the aesthetics of traditional business having completed his education in America as well arts and culture. Fukuhara’s various photobooks were very as having spent time in Paris in 1913 where he mixed with other-worldly, usually about places by water with literary avant-garde artists and pursued his own art photography. associations. His last published book The Sunny Hawaii Recalled to Japan at the advent of the First World War, (1935) embraced a more modernist clarity of light and form. Fukuhara took over direction of the old family pharmacy Fukuhara’s advocacy of an international style of business, and during the 1920s created the international Pictorialist art photography while seeking to define a cosmetics corporation Shiseido. His personal art, however, national character parallels the activities of Harold Cazneaux was very romantic and his first photobook – published in and his Australian contemporaries in founding the Sydney Japan in 1922 – was of soft-focus impressionistic studies Camera Circle in 1916 to promote an Australian school of from his pre-war sojourn in Paris. sunshine photography expressing the national character. In 1930 Fukuhara travelled to China and photographed Gael Newton the long-established tourist destination of the West Lake Senior Curator, Australian and International Photography at Hangzhou. The sub-title came from his influential 1923

40 national gallery of australia new acquisition International Prints, Drawings and Illustrated Books

The Chapman Brothers Disasters of war

Since 1990, Jake and Dinos Chapman have successfully deterioration. Re-translating Goya’s war imagery and re- Jake and Dinos Chapman plate 14 from the Disasters worked as a sculptural team who employ shock tactics contextualising their own sculptural works, the Chapman of war portfolio 1999 to make statements about, amongst other things, the Brothers have created nightmarish image upon nightmarish etching, drypoint and aquatint warmongering of the capitalist West. When the Chapman image, the culmination of which is a powerful statement The Orde Poynton Bequest, Brothers decided to produce a series of prints in 1999 the about human evil in the 21st century. If you feel sick, you’re 2005 result was a portfolio of 83 exquisitely executed etchings supposed to. If you want to look away, but can’t, the that takes both its name, and its inspiration, from Francisco Chapmans have succeeded again. Goya’s famous cycle of prints Los desastres de la guerra In many of the etchings, the postmodernist combination [The disasters of war], 1810–20. of infantile humour and profound horror allows the artists In a highly skilled but idiosyncratic application of to simultaneously seduce and revolt their audience. Not an aquatint, drypoint and hard and soft-ground etching, easy task when you consider, as the Chapmans do, that The Disasters of war seems to herald a return to the time- the audience is made up of desensitised spectators. The honoured techniques and perfection of process found Chapmans’ tactic is to position their audience as voyeurs, in traditional etchings. However, this intimate aesthetic only to disgust them with the depravity of the world in which contrasts profoundly with the relentless repetition of they live. As a result, the Disasters of war portfolio affects swastikas, mutilated bodies, scenes of torture and devilish the viewer with the full force of a visual slap across the face. figures that the Chapmans present as subject matter. Offensive? Distressing? Yes. And that’s the point. Their view of the world is that it is one that has gone Jaklyn Babington completely mad, a dystopia of human depravity and moral Assistant Curator, International Prints, Drawings and Illustrated Books artonview winter 2006 41 new acquisition Asian Art

Last rites: funerary bird from Vietnam

While the great architectural complexes of Angkor Wat and Borobodur have ensured that the Hindu-Buddhist sculpture of Southeast Asia is well known, the art created for rituals related to the earlier but enduring animist beliefs of the region is often overlooked. This is especially the case for the sculpture of Vietnam which has always been eclipsed in western art collections by the arts of neighbouring Cambodia. This striking stylised image of a bird, probably representing a peacock, was made for a burial site of one of the ethnic minorities, primarily dry rice cultivators, who inhabit the forested highland areas of central and northern Vietnam. Left to disintegrate after the graves are ritually abandoned, few such sculptures have survived. This fine example has been in a private collection in France since it was collected in the early 20th century. As a result, unlike most Jarai funerary sculpture, which is often badly eroded and grey in colour from being exposed to the elements, the surface of the bird is polished and well preserved. For the animist Jarai, a year or so following a death, an elaborate ceremony is performed when a large house- like tomb structure of wood and basketry is constructed. The grave site in the village of the dead is surrounded by sculptures of birds, animals and, more commonly, human figures, sometimes with overt genitalia and depicted in sexual acts. Two fretwork wooden panels from the top of such a tomb-house, in the Gallery’s collection of ancestral art once belonging to the Surrealist artist Max Ernst, depict birds and human figures in erotic poses. This starkly angular bird is perched on a pair of oxen horns or tusks, the tips of which are now missing. A small cavity on the top of its head indicates a missing crest. Unlike many Southeast Asian cultures, figurative sculpture is only created by the Jarai for these secondary funerary rites. Also unusual for a region where pilgrimages to the grave sites of ancestors are considered vital to the wellbeing of the spirit of the deceased and the living descendants, the Jarai neglect the village of the dead with its tombs and surrounding sculptures after the ceremony of closure. Both the dead and the living move on, the community returning to the village of the living and its everyday activities, while the spirit of the dead moves westward, perhaps to return in the future as dew possibly Jarai people, Vietnam at the birth of a child to the family of the deceased. Funerary bird early 20th century Ron Radford teak Director

42 national gallery of australia new acquisition Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

19th-century Torres Strait Island mask

The maker of this extremely rare and highly significant cultural object is unknown, but it is immediately recognisable as being from the Torres Strait Islands, and as having been created during the 19th century, if not earlier. The majority of Torres Strait Islander masks were used and worn during sacred ceremonies, initiations, sorcery and other customary rituals. This particular mask may have come from the north-western part of the Torres Strait, possibly Saibai Island, or been traded from a nearby coastal village in Papua New Guinea. Nineteenth-century Torres Strait Islander objects are rarely found in either private or public collections in Australia due to the destruction of cultural material that occurred as a result of the arrival of Christian missionaries in the late 1800s. Torres Strait Islanders faced significant historical, cultural and social change when Reverend Samuel MacFarlane of the London Missionary Society brought Christianity to the Torres Strait on 1 July 1871. This is referred to by the Islanders as ‘Coming of the Light’ and is celebrated annually on 1 July by all Torres Strait Islander communities throughout the Torres Strait and mainland Australia. Examples of 19th-century Torres Strait Islander masks are held in the collections of the Cambridge University of Archaeology and Anthropology, UK (Haddon Collection); the Metropolitan Museum, New York, USA; the de Young Fine Arts Museum of San Francisco, USA; Horniman Museum, London, UK; the Pitt-Rivers Museum, Oxford, UK; and the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Wellington, NZ. This acquisition emphasises the importance of building upon Torres Strait Islander representation within the

National Collection. The work is on display in Right here Unknown Maker right now: Recent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Torres Strait Islander Mask – 19th century Torres acquisitions, Project Gallery, National Gallery of Australia Strait Islander 19th century 13 May – 13 August 2006. wood, shell, resin, human hair, fibre string, white pigment purchased 2006 Brenda L Croft Senior Curator, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Simona Barkus Trainee Curator, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art

artonview winter 2006 43 new acquisition International Decorative Arts and Design

Sergei Isupov To be object of attentions

Combining engaging and surreal subject matter with consummate craftsmanship, Sergei Isupov’s painted figural ceramics alarm us at first glance, as we realise that they are revealing only one of several contradictory faces to the viewer. In the theatre of his imagination, heads sprout secondary figures, horns and hybrid animal limbs while faces and bodies become screens for a flotilla of painted figures that seem to have escaped from the world of Hieronymous Bosch. Isupov’s subjects exude calm repose, making the theatre of anguished humanity painted on them even more poignant as bizarre figures play out themes of birth, love, sex, jealousy, anxiety and death. Each porcelain work is hand-built and painted with stained porcelain slip and glazes before being fired, a time-consuming and exacting process that Isupov tackles with equal measures of playfulness and discipline. Born in Stavropole, Russia in 1963 and trained in classical painting and ceramics in Kiev, Ukraine, and Tallin, Estonia, before taking residency in the United States of America in 1993, Isupov has personal experience of two very different cultures. His graphic visualisation of that duality is encapsulated in To be object of attentions, with its two faces looking in opposite directions, apparently unaware of each other but linked by figures that seem to have materialised from a shared imagination. Sergei Isupov’s ceramics were first seen in Australia in the National Gallery of Australia’s 2005 exhibition, Transformations: the language of craft, during which he spoke on his work at the Gallery before undertaking a studio residency at the JamFactory Contemporary Craft and Design Centre in Adelaide. This work, one of the most- discussed in the exhibition, was acquired in 2005, adding a new dimension to the Gallery’s collection of contemporary ceramics.

Sergei Isupov Robert Bell To be object of attentions Senior Curator, Decorative Arts and Design 2004 painted and glazed porcelain Purchased 2005 Photograph: Katherine Wetzel, courtesy Ferrin Gallery

44 national gallery of australia travelling exhibitions winter 2006

Place made: Australian Print Workshop The Elaine & Jim Wolfensohn Gift Supported by Visions of Australia, an Australian Travelling Exhibitions: Government Program supporting touring exhibitions The 1888 Melbourne Cup and three suitcases by providing funding assistance for the development of works of art: Red case: Myths and Rituals and touring of cultural material across Australia includes works which reflect the spiritual This exhibition is a snapshot of the involvement beliefs of different cultures; Yellow case: Form, of Australian artists in the production of prints Space, Design reflects a range of art making and their concerns stylistically, technically and processes; and Blue case: Technology. The Tim Maguire Hollyhocks 1991 politically produced at the Australian Print Seated Ganesha Sri Lanka suitcases thematically present a selection of (detail) National Gallery of 9th–10th century (detail) from Australia, Canberra Australian Workshop between 1981 and 2002. The works Red case: myths and rituals art and design objects for the enjoyment of Print Workshop Archive 2, are selected from an archive of 3,500 works National Gallery of Australia, children and adults in regional, remote and purchased with the assistance of Canberra the Gordon Darling Australasian acquired by National Gallery of Australia in 2002 metropolitan centres that may be borrowed Print Fund 2002 through the assistance of the Gordon Darling free-of-charge. nga.gov.au/Wolfensohn Australasian Print Fund. nga.gov.au/Placemade Geelong Gallery, Geelong Vic., Red case: Myths and Rituals and Yellow 7 April – 4 June 2006 case: Form, Space and Design Australian Embassy in Washington, Washington DC, USA, MOIST: Australian watercolours 10 April – 25 June 2006 Moist is a rare glimpse into the National Gallery of Australia’s extraordinary collection of Coffs Harbour City Gallery, David Wallace Australian watercolours. While the title refers Stockman and horse 1997 10 July – 24 September 2006 to the liquid nature of watercolour, the word recycled materials including wire, ‘moist’ elicits images of an atmospheric, physical fabric, plastic, buttons National Gallery of Australia, Blue case: Technology or emotional state of being. The watercolours Canberra Australian Embassy in Washington, in Moist will demonstrate how Australian artists Washington DC, USA, have created visual representations of such Kenneth Macqueen 10 April – 25 June 2006 Summer sky c. 1935 (detail) states, from the highly figurative to the purely watercolour and pencil on paper Purchased 1965 National Gallery abstract and intensely emotional. While each Barossa Regional Gallery, Barossa SA, of Australia, Canberra has its own story there are also common threads 3 July – 30 July 2006 © The Macqueen family that draw them together. nga.gov.au/Moist Caloundra Regional Art Gallery, Perc Tucker Regional Art Gallery, Townsville QLD, Caloundra QLD, 26 May – 9 July 2006 7 August – 17 September 2006

Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, Karl Lawrence Millard Mornington Vic., Lizard grinder 2000 (detail) brass, bronze, copper, sterling The 1888 Melbourne Cup 25 July – 24 September 2006 silver, money metal, Peugeot Australian Embassy in Washington, mechanism, stainless steel screws Washington DC, USA, National Gallery of Australia, An artist abroad: the prints of James Canberra 10 April – 25 June 2006 McNeill Whistler James McNeill Whistler was a key figure in Exhibition venues and dates are subject to the European art world of the 19th century. change. Please contact the gallery or venue before Influenced by the French Realists, the Dutch, your visit. For more information please contact Venetian and Japanese masters Whistler’s (612)6240 6556 or email: [email protected]. prints are sublime visions of people and the places they inhabit. nga.gov.au/Whistler James McNeill Whistler University Art Museum, University Portrait of Whistler 1859 (detail) etching and drypoint of Queensland, St Lucia QLD, National Gallery of Australia, 6 August – 1 October 2006 The 1888 Melbourne Cup (detail) Canberra The Elaine and Jim Wolfensohn Gift National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

The National Gallery of Australia Travelling Exhibitions Program is generously supported by Australian airExpress.

artonview winter 2006 45 new acquisition

The Anton Bruehl Gift

Gallery of Australia. The Anton Bruehl Gift is the highest in value ever to have been presented to the photography collection. Now in the art store at the Gallery, Anton Bruehl’s work keeps company with that of his Australian contemporary Max Dupain, as well as a gem-like collection of mid 20th-century American advertising photography. While in Australia in 2001, Anton Bruehl Jr visited the National Gallery of Australia after hearing of the Gallery’s purchase of a selection of iconic Bruehl prints, in part with funds from Dr Peter Farrell. We viewed the Gallery’s collection of American advertising photography and maintained contact through the following years. In 2004 I visited the Bruehls in San Francisco where, sitting all works Gift of Anton From the late 1920s in New York, Anton Bruehl on their couch, I first heard that Anton Jr wanted his Bruehl Jr, 2006, through the American Friends of the (1900–1982) was the doyen of advertising photography. collection to come to Australia. The Bruehl Gift of 112 National Gallery of Australia He is best known today as a pioneer of brilliant colour photographs including some 20 original colour images

Anton Bruehl Lexington photography produced under exclusive contract to the covers Bruehl’s career from the 1920s through to the Avenue New York studio logo Condé Nast magazine group. Bruehl also specialised figure studies of the 1950s. Although he has travelled to

Martin Bruehl in theatre studies, often recreating sets and scenes Australia a number of times on business, Anton Bruehl Portrait of Anton Bruehl in the studio, New York 1937 from musicals in his studio for absolute quality Jr has no strong connections with Australia; his singular as published in a Condé Nast control. He was equally acclaimed internationally in art gesture is in recognition of his father’s birthplace, simply magazine article on ‘Cinema Arts’ in 1937 photography salons and in 1933 published an award- saying ‘it felt right’. winning book of photographs of Mexico in a classic Anton Bruehl first took up photography as a Anton Bruehl Swimsuit advertisement straight documentary style. teenager after his older brother Martin gave him a box 1950s dye transfer colour photograph Despite his German name, Anton Bruehl was not camera. He developed his skills in Melbourne where one of the many European photographers drawn or he trained as an electrical engineer and worked for an driven to America in the 1930s; instead he was from American engineering firm with colleagues who were the dry regions of South Australia, born in Hawker in also interested in camera art. Bruehl immigrated to New 1900. His German-born father was a well-respected York in 1919 to work for Western Electric. Some years and technically inventive medical doctor, a skill passed after his arrival in New York, Bruehl was inspired to make on, as Anton was a meticulous technician and skilled photography his vocation after studying and teaching at craftsman. Clarence White’s School of Photography in New York. In February this year, businessman and San Francisco Bruehl was in partnership briefly with Ralph Steiner, art collector Anton Bruehl Jr presented his personal who worked with Bruehl on launching a hugely popular collection of his father’s work to the National Gallery of series of photographic tableaux advertisements for Australia through the American Friends of the National Weber and Heilbroner fabrics in the pages of the New

46 national gallery of australia artonview winter 2006 47 Yorker in 1927–30. In these images cut-out paper figures of three men in suits were seen carrying on through various travels and adventures throughout which their clothing triumphed. The ‘Fabric Group’ ads won Bruehl the Art Directors Club Medal for 1928. Bruehl opened his second, larger studio on Lexington Avenue in 1927 and persuaded his brother Martin, a structural engineer in Australia, to immigrate to New York. The brothers then brought their parents to live in America. The Bruehl studio began to supply images regularly for the Condé Nast publications – Vogue, Vanity Fair and House and Garden. At Nast’s instigation and despite the cutbacks in most magazines during the Depression, Bruehl worked with photo-technician Fernand Bourges on developing very high quality colour photographs. The first of 195 Bruehl–Bourges process colour photographs appeared in the May 1932 issue of Vogue. The cost of production was enormous but so were the meticulous and inventive tableaux Bruehl designed for each job. Bruehl became an American citizen in 1940 when he married journalist Sara Barnes. They had three children, Steven, David and Tony (the donor of the Bruehl Gift). The Bruehl studio remained in operation until 1966. Anton retired to Florida in the 1970s and died in San Francisco in 1982. The Bruehl family never returned to Anton Bruehl Australia, but, interestingly, Anton named the beloved Christmas pageant advertisement 1950s dye sailboat he built, the Yarra. The National Gallery is transfer colour photograph undertaking a major retrospective and publication on Anton Bruehl Bruehl’s career. a ‘Four Roses’ Whiskey advertisement c. 1950 dye Gael Newton transfer colour photograph Senior Curator, Photography Anton Bruehl Unidentified man in workshop c. 1925 gelatin silver photograph

48 national gallery of australia development office

Crescent Moon: Islamic art and civilisation in collection of Southeast Asian textiles and the annual Ron Radford and John Ellice-Flint at the opening of Southeast Asia Masterpieces for the Nation Appeal. For more information Crescent Moon: Islamic Art and The Gallery has been delighted with the partnership on the Foundation please contact the Development Office Civilisation in Southeast Asia formed with Santos – the major sponsor of Crescent on (02) 6240 6454. Moon: Islamic art and civilisation in Southeast Asia. The Managing Director, John Ellice-Flint spoke at the opening Sculpture Garden Sunday and demonstrated a keen interest in and a support for The Rotary Club of Belconnen has been a continuing Southeast Asian Art. supporter of the Gallery. We would like to thank them for The Gallery would also like to take this opportunity the Children’s Easels that were purchased for use on the to thank the Gordon Darling Foundation for providing a Sculpture Garden Sunday on 5th March 2006, they will grant towards the curator’s research for the catalogue. also be used at other children’s events held by the Gallery. Without this generous contribution, the production of this exquisite catalogue would not have been possible. The Masterpieces for the Nation Appeal Myer Foundation also provided a grant for the educational This year an oil painting by Sydney Long, Flamingoes resource that has been received with much enthusiasm c. 1906, has been selected for our Masterpieces for from teachers and students and public program events. the Nation Appeal 2006. Enclosed with this edition of I hope you were able to attend the Crescent Moon artonview is information about the work and the Appeal. Cultural Day on 13 May. This unique and exciting occasion This is your opportunity to make a donation and share was kindly supported by the Myer Foundation, Australia- the excitement of knowing this exceptional work will Malaysia Institute and the Australia-Indonesia Institute. bring pleasure to many future generations. All donors will be invited to an event, hosted by the Director, to Constable: Impressions of land, sea and sky celebrate this acquisition. Please forward your donation We would also like to thank Booz Allen Hamilton who (on the enclosed form) to Silvana Colucciello in the supported the exhibition through a contra arrangement Development Office or telephone her on (02) 6240 6454 and have been providing consulting services to the Gallery. with payment details. Once again, we thank our committed and long-term supporters: Qantas Freight and Channel Seven for assisting Farewell to Lyn Conybeare with transport and promotion of the exhibition. Lyn Conybeare, Head of Development and Sponsorship (and previous author of this column), worked at the The National Gallery of Australia Foundation Gallery for 14 years and had devoted the last five years to The Gallery relies heavily on the financial support of expanding the Sponsorship and Development programs individuals to assist in acquiring works of art for the at the Gallery. Lyn has moved to Sydney and her ideas, National Collection. Most donations to assist collection energy and dedication will be greatly missed by all staff, development are channelled through the National donors and sponsors of the Gallery. Gallery of Australia Foundation. Other fundraising Annalisa Millar initiatives include the ongoing Treasure a Textile program, Coordinator, Development and Sponsorship supporting the conservation of the Gallery’s renowned

artonview winter 2006 49 children’s gallery

Come rain or shine Until 16 July 2006

Curating an exhibition for children is always a challenge. Firstly curators, educators and exhibition designers get together to consider what it might be like to be a child visiting this large grey cement building in search of something friendly, small, interactive and fun. Secondly we take a concept, often related to an exhibition at the Gallery or a theme that we hope will appeal to a young audience. Then, using works of art from the collection, we design an interactive environment that takes the experiences of children as the starting point: the under fives love three-dimensional objects that remind them of their fantasies and engender wonder or intrigue, whereas older children might prefer two-dimensional or more conceptually challenging works. The theme of Come rain or shine is the weather and is linked to the major exhibition, Constable: Impressions of land, sea and sky. Many of John Constable’s paintings have skies full of cumulous storm clouds, grey sheets of rain coming or going, or rainbows, sunshine and shade. Through the process of examining how artists represent weather conditions using paint, video and sculpture, young children are prompted to become more aware of the world around them, to imagine what clothes they should wear for protection and comfort and to create their own artistic works at home or at school. To select the works for the show, we trawled through hundreds of contact sheets of black-and-white photographs of works in the National Collection, works that are often seldom if ever on display. We selected works of art that have a connection with weather and that would appeal to children. For Come rain or shine we found dramatic 19th-century paintings of ships foundering on rocky shores; a huge video of a skilful skateboarder dancing on his board against a stormy sky; a massive Mitec culture, Mexico snowscape; two ‘hot’ paintings, one dusty and one Tlaloc the Rain God 1200–1300 Veracruz / Mexico green; a small naïve painting of a monsoonal storm; and ceramic, earthenware, the amazing 800-year-old rain god, Tlaloc, from Mexico pigment National Gallery of Australia, whose snake-ridden head forms a neat connection with Canberra

50 national gallery of australia the Rainbow Serpent from Arnhem Land, installed next components also enrich the experience for children of any James Fardoulys The channel country no. 3 to him. Tlaloc sits at the entrance to the exhibition, arms age. Pressing buttons that change coloured light on the 1965 oil on canvas on folded, teeth bared. A push of a button enables children Constable landscape print demonstrates how an artist can plywood National Gallery of Australia, to hear his story accompanied by the sounds of thunder, use colour to enhance the mood of a landscape, a magnet Canberra rain and wind. board demonstrates how artists create an illusion of space Works of art are displayed with questions on in their landscapes and flip boards encourage children to accompanying labels that encourage a Gallery mini visitor think further about how we must wear the right clothes or to explore the way artists create the sense of weather we will get sunburnt, wet or cold. in their paintings. For example, the monsoonal storm in We enjoy the task of transforming the Children’s the small painting The channel country no. 3, by James Gallery into a magical experience for these special Fardoulys is graphically represented by cyclonic clouds and visitors. And, of course, we hope that they will have fun, windswept trees and the heat of Russell Drysdale’s Emus remember the magic and bring their own children to the in a Landscape is almost palpable. Gallery in the future. a Although the exhibits have been carefully chosen to Jenny Manning connect with three- to seven-year-olds, the interactive Acting Manager, Education

artonview winter 2006 51 collection focus

Indian art: new acquisitions, directions and display

temple and palace architecture for South Asian artists. A stone ceiling panel in the form of a lotus further demonstrates the way in which key decorative elements are shared by the major religions of India: even the eight grotesque kirtimukha faces of glory, with bulging eyes, small pointed horns, and distinct fangs are found in the temple architecture of Jainism, Buddhism and Hinduism. Forming an introduction to the antiquity of certain key images in South Asian art is an image of the nagaraja serpent king, depicted in anthropomorphic form sheltering beneath the seven hoods of a cobra-like snake. A rare instance of a three-dimensional stone sculpture in the Gallery’s collection, the intermeshed coils of the serpent are sinuously depicted down the back of the red sandstone image. While derived from early nature worship, the naga serpent is a recurring image in Indian art, sheltering the meditating Buddha or buoying up the reclining Vishnu. A smooth oval egg shaped rock – a self born lingam – is also testament to the continuity of primal sexual imagery, Eastern Rajasthan, India The opening of a new Indian Gallery off the entrance restated in terms of the worship of the great god Shiva. Lotus ceiling foyer in August provides a perfect opportunity to reveal Inside the entrance to the new gallery, Buddhist 11th – 12th century stone National Gallery of Australia, recent additions to the National Collection. It also and Jain art predominates. Among the earliest surviving Canberra refocusses attention on works of art from South Asia sculptures from the Indian subcontinent are those from Kota school, Rajasthan, India acquired over 30 years of collecting Asian art. One of Temple hanging (pichhavai) the great Buddhist stupas, and the marble frieze from the Krishna’s fluting summons the most spectacular of the recent additions is a series vicinity of the Amaravati stupa in central east India shows the entranced gopis c.1840 opaque watercolour, gold of massive wooden brackets which act as a major the adoration of the empty throne, an iconic image of the and silver on cotton architectural feature drawing visitors into the newly earthly Buddha dating from the 3rd century a d . Another National Gallery of Australia, Canberra refurbished spaces and creating a series of niches within early image is an imposing standing figure of a richly which to display small miniature paintings, illuminated apparelled bodhisattva from Gandharan Pakistan revealing manuscript folios and small textiles. The angles of the a very different early Buddhist style. Dating from around intricately carved late 15th–16th century teak brackets echo 300 a d , the powerful influence of the forays of Alexander the structure of the Gallery building, while the combination the Great into this region of South Asia is evident in the of Hindu and Mughal and Persian inspired ornamentation strong Hellenistic features of the saviour, his drapery and is a subtle introduction to the works displayed within. In stance. Also in white marble, the tall figure is a superb fact a number of sculptures, such as the white marble Jain example of the syncretism of Greek and local iconography. arch which surrounds the seated jina provide elaborate Other Gandharan objects already in the collection include depictions of very similar architectural structures and a fine stupa gable depicting a scene from one of the Jataka ornamentation. Both the brackets themselves and their tales of the previous lives of the Buddha. recurrence in many sculptures attest to the centrality of

52 national gallery of australia artonview winter 2006 53 While the Gallery’s collection of Jain objects is small, large Indian paintings are scenes of royal progress, two sculptures of serene enlightened conquerors or such as the Maharana’s hunt, vibrant maps of popular liberators (jina) provide a fine introduction to the intricacy pilgrimage centres and tantric cosmological diagrams. The of Jain temple art: the serene white marble seated image dimensions of the Gallery building are ideally suited to the of a simply robed jina and the stark standing ‘sky-clad’ display of such large paintings. figure, completely unadorned in the abandonment pose, The collection of Hindu sculpture has also grown represent the two main orders of Jainism. In contrast the over the past year with the addition of a number of Gallery’s internationally renowned Indian textile holdings important works from the southern Indian 9th–13th includes a number of Jain works, the most famous of century Chola period. Arguably the pinnacle of Indian which shows a series of female courtiers in sumptuous bronze sculpture, the recent acquisitions of a fine large costume. The hand-drawn 5 metre long cloth, dated image of the child saint Sambandar and a delicate 1500, echoes on a large scale the imagery of illuminated rendition of the fierce deity Kali seated beneath the large Jain manuscripts of medieval west India. Textiles in trident of the god Shiva add significantly to the Gallery’s various techniques – double ikat, mordant painting, and existing collection of Chola bronzes which includes the pigment printing – are displayed throughout the new popular dancing Shiva Nataraj. However, the Chola Gallery. also were famed for their stone images, and the recent Also prominent are large pigment paintings which addition to the collection of the voluptuous lion-headed have been a recent collection development. The pichhvai goddesss Pratyangira demonstrates the superb skills of hangings are created for rituals celebrating the Hindu early Tamil Nadu artisans. deity Krishna. They contain some of the most charming The Gallery’s collection of Hindu art has been enriched images in Indian art – the popular blue god Krishna by the addition of these images of the Great Goddess, (an avatar of Vishnu) surrounded by adoring milkmaids one of the most revered deities who takes a wide variety and their herds of cows. Other subjects for the very of forms, both benign and threatening. The centrality of

54 national gallery of australia female deities, alone or paired with male gods as consorts In the new entrance-level Indian Gallery recent Gandhara region, Pakistan and shaktis, has been surprisingly under-represented in acquisitions join old favourites. In juxtaposing works of Standing bodisattva 300a d stone the Gallery’s collection. The Chola sculptures join works different media – stone, wood, paper, metal and cloth National Gallery of Australia, Canberra in paper, textile and stone featuring Durga, the demon – visitors are introduced the spectacular art of South Asia Vijayanagara period, slaying goddess. In another recent purchase, Lakshmi, through fine examples of key images from the major Tamil Nadu, India the Goddess of Abundance is shown in a lithe sensual strands of Indian culture and religion. In this process Door guardian (dvarapala) 15th century stone embrace with her consort Vishnu. existing holdings in the collection are enhanced by National Gallery of Australia, Another aspect of the art of the Indian sub-continent conversations with new works located close by, such as Canberra which has been a target of recent acquisitions is Islamic art. the huge 12th-century Pala dynasty stone stele depicting Shah Jahan period, Mughal empire, India The Gallery has good holdings of richly decorated textiles a majestic Vishnu flanked by two diminutive images of Open-worked pierced screen (jali) 1628-1658 displaying Mughal designs, ornamentation which is also his consorts Lakshmi and Sarasvati, now shown beside red sandstone present in Islamic architecture and other arts. An intricate the newly acquired panel showing Vishnu and Lakshmi National Gallery of Australia, Canberra openwork pierced stone screen from the 17th century in a dynamic embrace of more earthly proportions. The reign of great Mughal emperor-architect Shah Jahan addition of recently acquired works also encourages a – remembered best for his architectural masterpiece, the deeper appreciation of the range of cultural, religious Taj Mahal – demonstrates the shared imagery: the design and stylistic representation and imagery in the art of the of floral buds within a diagonal grid, subtly set within a Indian sub-continent. Along with the physical move to a mihrab arch is found on numerous early Indian textiles in more central and accessible location off the main foyer, the collection, examples of which will be displayed in this it is hoped that the displays in the new Indian Gallery will section of the Indian Gallery. The jali screen is presented so more successfully engage, excite and inform visitors about that visitors can appreciate the quality of the stone carving the arts of Asia. a on both front and back surfaces. Robyn Maxwell Senior Curator, Asian Art

artonview winter 2006 55 conservation

The Mermaid’s Tale

Dr H Maulana Pangkuningrat, Situated on the north coast of west Java, the royal Worn by men and women of the royal court, this Sultan Sepuh of Cirebon, Indonesia with the Skirt cloth palace Kraton Kasepuhan in Cirebon is one of the rare 19th-century skirt cloth displays the distinctive at the opening of Crescent oldest surviving royal centres in Indonesia. The art of blues, purples and pinks of Cirebon natural dyes. Close Moon: Islamic art and civilisation in Southeast Asia the sultanate incorporates an exciting range of regional inspection reveals elephants, spotted kijang deer, snakes

Cirebon, Indonesia and international motifs. The distinctive Cirebon designs and serpents, rabbits, monkeys, other quadrupeds Skirt cloth draw on ancient indigenous symbols, Hindu Javanese – possibly the kancil mouse-deer or babi rusa wild 19th century commercial cotton fabric, narratives, and a strong Chinese influence in compositions boar – various types of birds and, in between, fish and natural dyes; hand-drawn of layered rocks and clouds. Fanciful landscapes are crustaceans swim in pools among the lotuses. The most batik Conserved with the often depicted in carving, stone, metalwork, textiles, prominent figure in the design is the shrimp mermaid assistance of the Maxwell and painted on the sheaths of ceremonial keris daggers. archer, Dewi Urang Ayu, daughter of a great sea god and family in memory of Anthony Forge 2005 Such scenes are thought to have been inspired by the the wife of the Mahabharata hero Bima. The appearance 18th-century royal retreat Sunyaragi in Cirebon, although of shrimps on local batik may be an allusion to the name they also appear on intricately carved panels in the royal of the port city, Cirebon, which translates as Shrimp River. palace collection dating from as early as the 16th century. In Java different batik-making regions developed This rocky landscape, however, is most often depicted on distinctive styles and dye combinations. This textile is cotton batiks of the Cirebon region. The fragrant garden typical of the area around Cirebon, which was renowned designs (taman sari or taman arum) comprise horizontal for the quality of its hand-drawn wax batik. During much bands of rocky mountains, filled with a mixture of real of the 20th century, however, Cirebon batik production and mythical creatures. Shrines for pilgrims and grottos was in decline and it was only in the 1960s and 70s that for meditation can often be found among the mountain the region’s distinctive batik styles, especially the fragrant peaks and forest groves. garden designs, were revived.

56 national gallery of australia When the Gallery purchased this extraordinary textile Early on, spot treatment of isolated stains was Before treatment long horizontal tears and in 1989 it was stained and had many holes as well as undertaken and then all original repairs were carefully loss in top right-hand corner extensive splits and 28 cobbled repairs throughout the removed, releasing the areas of puckering. The textile was Before treatment (detail) old stitch repairs, tears work. While small sections of the textile’s unusual design then placed on a suction table and, section by section, and in-ground grime have been published, its display was hampered by its flushed with cleaning solution. While this washing method After treatment (detail) poor physical condition. In 2003 it was possible to display removed the overall discolouration from the fibres, it also textile cleaned and new adhesive fabric repair only a section of the cloth in the Gallery’s exhibition Sari enabled the creases to be carefully relaxed and flattened, to Sarong: 500 years of Indian and Indonesian textile allowing the distorted areas of the design to be realigned. exchange. Then it was possible to join the sections of the textile and Seven different types of stitch repairs, in a range of to fill in areas of loss by fixing patches of cotton fabric threads and executed with varying sewing ability, were to the back of the textile using a fully reversible adhesive identified on the batik. Close examination of these repairs heat set method. allowed us to formulate a textile repair history, piecing The spectacular textile, fondly known by the together its use by different owners. The repairs, although conservation department at the Gallery as the mermaid holding the textile together, caused additional problems batik, was a centrepiece of the recent exhibition, Crescent of creasing and distortion and were removed as part of its Moon: Islamic art and civilisation in Southeast Asia, shown treatment. The initial conservation of the work focussed at the Art Gallery of South Australia, in Adelaide and the primarily on cleaning and realignment, and was followed National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. a by extensive structural repair of splits and holes. The Charis Tyrrel entire top third of the cloth was found to be completely Textile Conservator detached from the rest of the textile. Robyn Maxwell Senior Curator, Asian Art

artonview winter 2006 57 1 2

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faces in view

1 Barbara Poliness, Maria Gravias and Leanne Burrows from the Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts at the opening of Crescent Moon: Islamic art and civilisation in Southeast Asia 2 Senators Bob Brown and Christine Milne with guests at the opening of Constable: Impressions of land, sea and sky 3 AGSA Curator of Asian Art and Crescent Moon curator James Bennett with Richard and Mary Owens at the Crescent Moon Members night 4 Constable co-curators Anna Gray, NGA Assistant Director, Australian Art and British art scholar John Gage at the media launch of Constable 5 NGA Senoir Curator, Photography Gael Newton and Assistant Director, Access Services Adam Worrall with artists Paula Dawson and David Sequeira at the opening of Constable 6 Gallery Council Members Lee Liberman, Roslynne Bracher and Roslyn Packer at the opening of Crescent Moon 7 NGA Director Ron Radford, Prime Minister of New Zealand Helen Clark and Senior Curator, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art Brenda Croft 8 AGNSW Head Curator of Asian Art Jackie Menzies with QAG Head of Asian, Pacific and International Art Suhanya Raffel at the opening of Crescent Moon 9 Former Ambassador of the Republic of Korea HE Mr Cho Sang-hoon and Mrs Cho with guests at the opening of Crescent Moon 10 Anna Gray presenting Helen Clark with a Constable exhibition catalogue 11 Sculpture Garden Sunday 12 Forecast: Art and Fashion 13 Forecast: Art and Fashion 14 Gallery Council Member Ashley Dawson-Damer with former Gallery Foundation Chairman Tony Berg and Carol Berg 15 Sculpture Garden Sunday 16 NGA Voluntary Guide Rosanna Hindmarsh, Jennifer Prescott and Maureen Bremner at the farewell dinner for Tony Berg access services

The Collection Study Room

Voluntary Guides, As set out in the Director’s Vision Statement for has only been accessible through CSR request. At 325.0 Els Sondaal and Phoebe Jacobi, and Collection Study the Gallery, ‘the collections have long outgrown the x 337.2 cm in size, it is too large for the study room Room Officer, Joanne Tuck- building and lack of display space is overwhelmingly the tables and remains folded in its box during viewings. The Lee, view an illustrated book Gallery’s greatest problem’. Meeting public demand for Gallery’s textile conservation staff, having spent several by Gilbert and George in the Collection Study Room access to a collection of over 110,000 works in a building years researching the techniques and fabrics used in the originally designed to house only a thousand leads to quilt, recently advised that it will only be brought out Voluntary Guides, Sylvia Shanahan, Setsuko Kennedy an increasing reliance on resources such as travelling once a year for public requests due to its fragility and and Jan Smith, view a exhibitions, the internet and storage study facilities. the resources involved in transporting and displaying it. collection of works by With over ninety per cent of the National Collection ‘Unfolded: the Rajah Quilt on view’ is a CSR initiative, Gilbert and George in the Collection Study Room now in storage, the Collection Study Room (CSR) remains whereby the quilt will be unfolded and displayed for one of the Gallery’s most popular research facilities since viewing between 11am and 12pm daily, 7–13 August 2006 its establishment in 1984. It is a free service for anyone (additional talks will be advertised in the events calendar). wishing to view works of art not on display or on loan. Public talks are regularly held in the CSR, allowing The number of collection study rooms in Australia and visitors to learn about the collection, particularly those overseas is increasing and involve staff from curatorial, works of art, such as illustrated books, that are difficult conservation, art storage, education, public programs to view in their entirety when on display. Visitors are and visitors’ services departments. Many institutions encouraged to refer to the Gallery’s online catalogue provide specialist services. For example, they might and publications (many of which are also available concentrate on works on paper or limit access to tertiary online) to select the works that they wish to view, and students or qualified researchers. However, the nature of will be referred to the appropriate curator if specialist a collection that belongs to the nation justifies an attempt expertise is required. Some works of art will be too to process as many collection access requests as possible. large, fragile or light-sensitive to be available for private The Gallery’s study room adjoins the on-site storage viewings, but it is always worth asking. To closely inspect facilities and is utilised by staff, researchers, curators from the detail of a watercolour that is not under glass, or other galleries, student groups, art and craft societies a rare book of botanical prints in its original box, is and members of the public. The most frequent request all part of the Collection Study Room experience. a for the CSR is The Rajah quilt, an iconic work produced Joanne Tuck-Lee by convict women on board The Rajah, during its journey Collection Study Room Officer towards Hobart Town in 1841. The quilt, which has captured the imagination of visitors since its acquisition For Collection Study Room bookings, phone (02) 6240 6524 or email [email protected]. The catalogue in 1989, is too light-sensitive for regular exhibition and is available online at nga.gov.au/CollectionSearch

60 national gallery of australia reawaited refurbished refreshed BARTON regard • Canberra’s Premier Boutique Heritage Hotel (est 1927) • 4 Star Property • Located within the Parliamentary Triangle • Close to All Major Attractions • Bar & Licensed Restaurant open seven days lunch • Foxtel (Heritage Rooms only) 12.00–2.30 pm • 24 Hour reception weekend brunch 9.30–11.30 am available for private events t: 02 6240 6666

John Constable: Impressions of Land, Sea and Sky National Gallery of Australia until 12th June 2006

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Subject to availability (No availability during AFL Finals) The Brassey of Canberra When booking please quote – “Picasso and Pasta” Belmore Gardens and Macquarie Street, Barton ACT 2600 Telephone: 02 6273 3766 • Facsimile: 02 6273 2791 $350.00 all inclusive Toll Free Telephone: 1800 659 191 Email: [email protected] http: //www.brassey.net.au CANBERRAN OWNED AND OPERATED Phone: 03 9349 9700 Email: [email protected] 255 Drummond Street, Carlton Vic 3053 THE FINE ART OF HOSPITALITY

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the bell gallery proudly presents our 2006 ‘winter’ exhibition with a special selection of fine paintings and sculpture starting sunday 18th june from 11am 4 AUGUST – 3 SEPTEMBER 2006

Chapman Gallery Canberra 31 Captain Cook Crescent Manuka 2603 HEREAFTER Hours: Wed to Sun 11am–6pm Tel: 02 6295 2550 www.chapmangallery.com.au

IMANTS TILLERS Imants Tillers Portrait of a thought 101.6 x 213.36 cm 2005

Indigenous arts and craft * books and catalogues * calendars and diaries * prints and posters * gifts * jewellery * fine art cards * accessories * desirable objects * toys

Gallery Shop open 7 days 10am–5pm Phone 02 6240 6420 ngashop.com.au

New bags from Melbourne Designer Nicola Cerini $105 - $140 STANKF6668A_2_FP_AV_FA.indd 1 View The Waterfront Marketing Suite and Display Apartment, open daily 1-5pm. View Waterfront 1-5pm. The Suite Display and open daily Marketing Apartment, To learn more about this residential work of art, visit The Waterfront A magnificent expression of modern architecture, TheWaterfront already has architecture, expressionmodern of magnificent A SEE AMASTERPIECE COME TO LIFE. is the ideal time to secure your place at Canberra’s most prestigious address, Marketing Suite today.Marketing located on the banks of Lake Burley Griffin. located ofLake on banks the Call 1800098 831 www.the-waterfront.com.au On The Lake - Cnr Wentworth - Cnr Avenue Lake The On & Telopea Foreshore Kingston East, experienced unprecedented demand. Construction is now underway, so this this so underway, now is Construction demand. unprecedented experienced 13/4/06 11:51:32 AM

6668_2 9 – 30 August Wednesdays 6pm SPECIAL MEMBERS’ VIEWING This annual lecture series showcases the latest work of renowned Australian architects. 9 August Andrew Andersons from Peddle, Thorpe and Walker, Sydney 16 August Luigi Rosselli, Sydney 23 August Tim Jackson from Jackson Clements Burrows, Melbourne 30 August Shaun Lockyer from Arkhefield, Brisbane $60 Series; $50 members/RAIA/concession $20 Single; $15 members/RAIA/concession Presented in association with the ACT Chapter RAIA Sponsored by BCA Solutions Bookings essential James O Fairfax Theatre National Gallery of Australia, Canberra

Mr Ron Radford AM, Director National Gallery of Australia

requests the pleasure of your company at a Members Viewing of

Saturday 15 July 2006 6pm The evening will commence with an introduction to the exhibitions

in the James O Fairfax Theatre by

Dr Deborah Hart, Senior Curator, Australian Paintings and Sculpture and Brenda L Croft, Senior Curator, Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islander Art

Followed by a viewing of the exhibitions

Members /guests $40 Light refreshments Limited tickets – bookings essential RSVP 5 July 2006 (acceptances only) Phone 02 6240 6528

Imants Tillers The hyperborean and the speluncar 1986 oilstick, oil and synthetic polymer paint on 130 canvasboards Cruthers collection, Perth Michael Riley Untitled, from the series Cloud [feather] taken 2000 printed 2005 pigment prints, ultrachrome chromogenic inks on Ilford Gallery Pearl photographic paper Purchased 2005 National Gallery of Australia, Canberra Reproduced courtesy of the Michael Riley Foundation and VISCOPY, Australia Photo: John Gollings Richmond House, Jackson Clements Burrows 14 July – 16 October 2006 artonview o art n v i ew

ISSUE No.46 ISSUE ISSUE w in t e r o.46 winter 2006 winter N o.46 2006 NA 2006 T IONAL GALLE R Y OF Y AUS TR ALIA

imants tillers • michael riley • James Rosenquist