25 August 1978 JAMES GLEESON INTERVIEWS: GRACE CROWLEY 25 August 1978 JAMES GLEESON: Miss Crowley, will we begin with some of the drawings you, did in your earlier period. Could you tell us about this drawing of the horse? GRACE CROWLEY: Thatʼs my favourite model. Her name is Flower. She was called Flower because of the dapples, the dappled grey mare. I thought, ʻMy father, after all, is a bit poetic; he christened her because of the dapples. I love drawing draught horses. This one is 1937, is it? Has it a date? Or is it the bull, 1937—Prince Imperial? JAMES GLEESON: Prince Imperial is 1937. We donʼt have a date for— GRACE CROWLEY: I think this one would be somewhere about the mid-thirties. JAMES GLEESON: Were you living in the country at that time? Obviously you had horses and cattle. GRACE CROWLEY: I was born in the country. JAMES GLEESON: Whereabouts? GRACE CROWLEY: At Cobbadah, New South Wales. JAMES GLEESON: Whereabouts is that? I canʼt recall. GRACE CROWLEY: Perhaps you know Barraba? JAMES GLEESON: Yes, on the northern tablelands? GRACE CROWLEY: You certainly know Tamworth. JAMES GLEESON: Yes, I know Tamworth. GRACE CROWLEY: I really donʼt know how far. JAMES GLEESON: But it is in the New England area? GRACE CROWLEY: Thatʼs right. JAMES GLEESON: And you spent all your earlier life up there? GRACE CROWLEY: I was born there. From my earliest recollections I remember being very interested in watching the horses and the cows and the men harvesting. I longed to do a thing of the shearers, but father would not let me much into the shed. I did do two or three sketches of the shearers, but I just gave them to the shearers. 25 August 1978 JAMES GLEESON: I see. But obviously when you drew Flower you had been well trained in drawing. You had been to art school by the time you made this drawing of Flower? Is that so? GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. I had been to Andre LʼHote. JAMES GLEESON: This was after you had come back from Ireland? GRACE CROWLEY: I came back in 1931. I left in 1926, and spent four years abroad studying, but only three of those years with Andre LʼHote. JAMES GLEESON: Did you study at all in Sydney before you went abroad? GRACE CROWLEY: Oh yes, with Julian Ashton, at the Sydney Art School. I was a student there. In 1912 I became a full-time student. Then, when Elioth Gruner resigned, Julian asked me to be an assistant teacher in his place. JAMES GLEESON: I see. So you were teaching at the school before you went overseas? GRACE CROWLEY: I taught there for four and a half years. JAMES GLEESON: And this was done after your return from Europe. Your father still had the property up there? GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. JAMES GLEESON: And you would go up for holidays? GRACE CROWLEY: Thatʼs right. The place was sold after my parentsʼ death in 1953. JAMES GLEESON: So up to that time you were quite often up there? GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. I did many drawings of horses and cows and things like that before I even had a lesson. JAMES GLEESON: Was there any history in your family of artistic interest? Did you have brothers, sisters or parents interested in art? GRACE CROWLEY: They were all quite sane, except me! JAMES GLEESON: I see. So you were the only one who had this interest in art, and it was a very early interest? GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. JAMES GLEESON: You knew from the beginning what you wanted to do? GRACE CROWLEY: I do not know whether you could put it that way. You do things because you canʼt help doing them. 2 25 August 1978 JAMES GLEESON: Yes. We do not have any of your very early drawings from the country before you went to an art school, but could you tell me about Prince Imperial? That is a different medium. That is ink and watercolour, is it? GRACE CROWLEY: Firstly, I drew him in pencil. I remember way back when I was in Paris and Albert Gleizes showed me a beautiful drawing of a bull. JAMES GLEESON: Another bull? A Courbet? GRACE CROWLEY: A Courbet. He was very pleased with it; he admired the beautiful line that Courbet had. Courbet, too, was very interested in drawing animals. So when I saw Prince Imperial lying on the grass one morning in the sunlight, I thought, ʻCourbet!ʼ and I ran for my sketchbook. JAMES GLEESON: This is worked in ink and wash, is it? GRACE CROWLEY: It was so long ago. This is ink. JAMES GLEESON: It doesnʼt matter because we can always check that back in the Gallery. GRACE CROWLEY: My draught horses were very patient. JAMES GLEESON: From there can we move to this one? In time, that would perhaps be the next one of yours that we have. GRACE CROWLEY: This one went into Exhibition I in David Jones Gallery. JAMES GLEESON: I notice it has two titles: sometimes Woman and sometimes Annunciation. Do you accept both titles, or would you prefer it to be known as one or the other? GRACE CROWLEY: I donʼt see any annunciation in anything! JAMES GLEESON: No—I donʼt know how it got that title. Shall we call it Woman? GRACE CROWLEY: It doesnʼt look much like one. JAMES GLEESON: It does. I think it is a very beautiful painting. It is travelling now in the Aspects exhibition. GRACE CROWLEY: Yes, I know. JAMES GLEESON: It is dated 1939. GRACE CROWLEY: Thatʼs right. JAMES GLEESON: You mentioned that it was shown in that first exhibition, Exhibition I. GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. JAMES GLEESON: And from there it went into the Evatt collection? 3 25 August 1978 GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. JAMES GLEESON: We acquired it from the Evatt collection. GRACE CROWLEY: Canberra acquired it from the Evatt collection. JAMES GLEESON: Thatʼs right. At that stage, in 1939, had you begun working on a completely abstract— GRACE CROWLEY: I was just beginning. Balson was one influence. In 1937 the school at 215 George Street closed, so I lost the big room. At my place it was not so good to pose a nude model. So there were those two influences. Gradually from this I began to paint completely abstract, like these things here. There is one in the corridor that is a bit like this. JAMES GLEESON: Yes, I remember it from last visit. So the complete abstract began around 1940 or 1941? GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. I would have to check on that. JAMES GLEESON: But it was around that period. This was towards the end of your really figurative period? GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. Balson put on a show at Anthony Hordens in 1941 which was completely non-objective. That gave me a tremendous lift. JAMES GLEESON: That must have been the first non-objective show in Australia. GRACE CROWLEY: It was, I believe. That has never been contradicted. JAMES GLEESON: No. Compared to earlier works in your figurative style, which are more forcibly architecturally modelled, this seems much freer in approach. This one seems to be much freer in the way you have applied the paint. GRACE CROWLEY: Yes, I agree with that. I painted the portrait of Gwen Wrigley in 1930, or 1931. I sent in to the Archibald and it was hung, but it didnʼt get the prize. Soselles saw it. I think that is one reason why he wanted to meet me when I came back from abroad in 1930. According to what I understand from your book, he came back in 1931. JAMES GLEESON: Was it a deliberate attempt to move from the more architectural type of treatment in this picture? GRACE CROWLEY: Yes, it was. It was difficult for me, because I had been tremendously interested in the figure in itself, and anatomically interested. JAMES GLEESON: The structure of the form. GRACE CROWLEY: Yes. The structure of the human figure absolutely fascinated me. So I guess I paid more attention to that sort of thing than did any of the other students in the Sydney Art when I was there. We had the skeleton and the anatomical figure, and I would trot along to the museum and make drawings there of hands—that sort of thing. 4 25 August 1978 JAMES GLEESON: A thorough training. GRACE CROWLEY: Tremendously interested. Then, when I went abroad and studied under Andre LʼHote, he knocked me to pieces for a while. In the end he told me I was one of his best students. JAMES GLEESON: So that background of training was useful, after all. GRACE CROWLEY: I think so. I have never regretted my study in the Sydney Arts. Nor have I regretted those lovely sketching trips that Julian would take us on where we would look at a landscape from an Impressionist point of view. I donʼt know which Andre LʼHote hated the most—what he called ʻles beaux artsʼ or lʼImpressionisme. JAMES GLEESON: He didnʼt like either? GRACE CROWLEY: He hated them. On the sketching trip at Maremond, Anne Dangar, Dorrit Black and I were there. The first thing he said when he saw my landscape was ʻlʼImpressionisme!ʼ JAMES GLEESON: And it wasnʼt a congratulatory remark. GRACE CROWLEY: Oh dear, no. I painted that one there at that time. JAMES GLEESON: But thatʼs not Impressionistic. GRACE CROWLEY: And the girl with the goats in the Melbourne gallery. I think he was very pleased with both paintings in the end. JAMES GLEESON: Ah, yes. GRACE CROWLEY: But I had to suffer.