Across a storied lifetime of art making, Margaret Olley’s (1923-2011) flower paintings – predominantly painted through the 1960s – remain some of her most beloved work. With a palette of greens and burnt oranges, Banksia (1970), exemplified her ability to capture a subject in a warm, painterly style without sacrificing detail. In 1964, artist and […]
In her Brisbane school days, Margaret Olley (1923-2011) was ‘always rushing around, quite rebellious, doing her own thing. She wasn’t particularly academic, so she wasn’t interested in any of that.’ It was at this time that encouragement from a particularly supportive art teacher, Caroline Baker, helped spark Olley’s interest in art making – a realisation […]
The peaceful setting depicted here is painted in oils directly onto the east wall of the old Rockley Mill. The artist, Edmund Ernest Edgar (c.1872–1965), completed the mural in October 1932 in readiness for the first meeting of the Rockley Branch of Toc H, a Christian social organisation and movement. Although the first Toc H […]
When Jean Bellette (1908–1981) painted this modernist still life in the kitchen of her newly-acquired weekender in Hill End, she could not have foreseen the legacy she was creating for the arts in Bathurst. Her painting won the inaugural Carillon City Festival Art Prize in 1955 and was the first work acquired for the Bathurst […]
All together, it took nine hours. Nine hours spent in the shuddering, claustrophobic hull of a WWI-era submarine. Cautiously travelling beneath an underwater minefield to then torpedo a battleship, only able to return to the safety of the open ocean via the same treacherous stretch of water. What type of person is capable of such […]
Like the artist who painted it, A Dry Billabong, Gunnedah, NSW (1950) is caught between worlds. John Salvana’s (1873-1956) portrayal of gum trees baking in the sun is typical for its time, even somewhat passé. The artwork captures the Australian landscape in an Impressionist style, a manner which had originated in France in the 1870s […]
For many artists, creative practice whether written, painted, sculpted or otherwise, is about exploring and explaining the human condition – the things that make us human including, birth, death, emotions and existence. It can ask big and broad or sweeping questions, about life, the universe, and our place in it. It can also explore more […]
A traditionalist in painting style, and an artist who worked primarily in oils, Joshua Smith (1905-1995) was a finalist in the 1937 Archibald Prize for this portrait of his father, titled J.W.A Smith. Prior to the 1940s, the Australian art scene was dominated by conservative artists. Though Sydney boasted progressive creative circles and ideas traditional art […]
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