Behind the Scenes Hans Heysen's Art World Networks
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Behind the Scenes Hans Heysen’s Art World Networks Ralph Body Department of Art History School of Humanities Faculty of Arts University of Adelaide February 2019 Behind the Scenes Hans Heysen’s Art World Networks Volume One Ralph Body Department of Art History School of Humanities Faculty of Arts University of Adelaide February 2019 i Table of Contents – Volume One Abstract .................................................................................................................. iii Thesis Declaration ................................................................................................... v Acknowledgements ................................................................................................ vii Abbreviations .......................................................................................................... ix Introduction .............................................................................................................. 1 Literature Review ................................................................................................ 8 Conceptual Framework and Methodology ........................................................ 22 Chapter One: Establishing a Career, c.1903-1914 ................................................. 33 1.1. 1904: Getting Established in the Cultural Field ...................................... 34 1.2. Gallery Validation: Recognition of Heysen’s Art by Municipal Collections ......................................................................................................... 40 1.3. Group Exhibitions: Showing with Artists’ Societies .............................. 48 1.4. Solo Exhibitions: Pursuing Commercial and Symbolic Rewards ........... 56 1.5. W. H. Gill, Commissions and Prestigious Clients .................................. 69 1.6. Visits, Visitors and Introductions: Heysen’s Expanding Art World Network ............................................................................................................. 76 1.7. Competing and Coexisting Criteria: European Credentials and Australian Characteristics .................................................................................................... 88 Chapter Two: Suspicion and Support: Heysen during the First World War ....... 111 2.1. Wartime Security Measures and their Effect on German-Australians ... 112 2.2. Multiple Conflicts: The NGV’s Decision to Renege on a Purchase ....... 119 2.3. Heysen’s Resignations from Artists’ Societies ....................................... 125 2.4. Heysen’s Finances and Place in the Field ............................................... 133 2.5. Nellie Melba’s Support ........................................................................... 138 2.6. Wartime Patronage from the Vice-Regency ........................................... 145 2.7. The Impact on Heysen’s Emotional Life ................................................ 151 Chapter Three: On the Same Page: Heysen and Art in Australia Magazine ....... 157 3.1. Sydney Ure Smith and Art in Australia .................................................. 158 3.2. Heysen and Sydney Ure Smith ............................................................... 169 3.3. The Art of Hans Heysen (1920) .............................................................. 177 3.4. Lionel Lindsay’s Writing on Heysen ...................................................... 185 3.5. Heysen and Reproductions of his Work ................................................. 195 ii 3.6. The Introduction of Heysen’s Flinders Ranges Works in 1928 .............. 201 Chapter Four: Where to Draw the Line? Heysen and Modern Art ...................... 219 4.1. Defining Modern Art in the Australian Context ..................................... 219 4.2. Hans Heysen’s Networks, c.1932-1951 .................................................. 228 4.3. Heysen’s Views on Modern Art ............................................................. 234 4.4. Involvement with the Australian Academy of Art, 1937-1949 .............. 266 4.5. Heysen, Lionel Lindsay and Addled Art, 1940-43 .................................. 278 4.6. Heysen and the Cultural Field, 1934-1951 ............................................. 291 Chapter Five: Competing Values: Heysen and the Art Market ........................... 309 5.1. Examining the Art Market ...................................................................... 310 5.2. The Art Boom, c.1916-1928 ................................................................... 315 5.3. The Depression and Second World War, 1929-1945 ............................. 332 5.4. The Post-War Period, 1946-1968 ........................................................... 349 5.5. Heysen and Collectors ............................................................................ 363 Conclusion ........................................................................................................... 371 Table of Contents - Volume Two Images ...................................................................................................................... 1 Appendix I: Chronology of Key Events, 1903-1968 ............................................. 77 Appendix II: Works by Hans Heysen acquired by Public Collections 1904-1915 ............................................................................................................................. 101 Appendix III: Works by Hans Heysen included in Group Exhibitions, 1899-1921 ............................................................................................................................. 105 Appendix IV: Heysen’s Lecture “Observations on Art,” 1906 ........................... 123 Appendix V: Hans Heysen and Lionel Lindsay’s Collaborative Review of the 1909 Federal Exhibition ....................................................................................... 135 Appendix VI: Hans Heysen in Sydney Ure Smith’s Publications, 1916-1949 ... 143 Appendix VII: Hans Heysen and the Collection of the National Gallery of South Australia before 1940 ........................................................................................... 161 Bibliography ........................................................................................................ 193 Primary Sources ............................................................................................... 193 Secondary Sources ........................................................................................... 210 iii Abstract The artist Hans Heysen is closely associated with the South Australian regional environment, which featured as the subject matter of his most celebrated works. At the same time, however, he also rapidly established a national reputation, achieving critical and commercial success in the interstate art worlds of Melbourne and Sydney. This dissertation investigates the significant role of Heysen’s art world networks in establishing, shaping and maintaining his career and reputation. Most of the existing scholarship on Heysen has either been biographical or concerned with analysing the style and subject matter of his paintings. While previous authors have alluded to the importance of his networks, these have not been their central focus of study. Similarly, Heysen’s ties to the urban Australian art worlds where his works were exhibited, reviewed and sold have been little researched. Heysen’s networks encompassed fellow artists, art critics, publishers, dealers, collectors and museum trustees and directors. Due to his geographical isolation written correspondence played an essential role in his long-distance career management, with the letters he exchanged providing valuable insights into the importance of his networks. Consequently, this dissertation has involved intensive archival research, cross-referencing the archives of Heysen and his correspondents, together with studying historic exhibition catalogues, art magazines and published reviews. The interpretation of this material has been informed by two complementary conceptual frameworks. The first is Howard Becker’s conceptualisation of art (and art world success) as the product of collaborative activity. This has been utilised when analysing the specific iv operations of Heysen’s networks. The second is Pierre Bourdieu’s notion of a ‘Field of Cultural Production,’ a metaphorical, changing space in which cultural agents compete for symbolic capital. These ideas have been employed to examine the structure of the Australian art world and the construction of reputation. This research demonstrates the essential role of Heysen’s art world networks in representing and advancing his interests. The support of key associates enabled Heysen to withstand the threats to his career presented by anti-German sentiments during the First World War, the impact of the Depression on the art market and the ascendency of modernism. While he generally benefited from his networks, the entrenched conservatism or overt commercial concerns of some of Heysen’s associates proved detrimental to his reputation. This dissertation shows that while Heysen’s traditionalist style and subject matter did not change dramatically over the course of his lengthy career, there were considerable shifts in the way in which he displayed, promoted and sold his works which reflected broader changes in the Australian art world. Similarly, perceptions of Heysen progressed from regarding him as an innovator in the Edwardian period, to an establishment figure during the interwar