Walsh Bay, on Gadigal land, is today a bustling, vibrant arts precinct. But on 26 June 1917, as the ship carrying the body of ‘The Maitland Wonder’, Les Darcy, docked in Sydney Harbour, the silence was loud enough to rival the busy wharves that groaned under the weight of wool for export. Several days later, […]
In small communities, multi-use spaces are common. Fields become sporting ovals on the weekend, town halls host markets and meetings, and basketball courts double as a learning ground for bike-riders, scooters, and skaters. Art photographer Michael Cook (1968-) has managed to capture this balance of order and chaos in his image Mother (Roller Skating), combining […]
Iconic images of the Australian outback or bush conjure up dust, heat and the thunder of wild brumbies. The strike of their hoofs echoing across vast plains and down mountain sides, the epitome of true freedom. In Mother (Rocking Horse), artist Michael Cook (1968-) evokes this same feeling in a comment on family, connection, and […]
Herbie Watkins heard rumblings below ground that made him run for his life. It was 5.15 am on 7 December 1910 and he was alone on site maintaining the temporarily closed West Wallsend-Killingworth Colliery. Luckily, Watkins was at a safe distance when the catastrophic explosion punctured the early morning silence, waking residents of the surrounding […]
Conceived in 1995 as part of Tamworth’s Australian Country Music Festival, the city’s annual exhibition It’s a Guitar Shaped World invites artists to create a work in response to the exhibition title. Each year, since its inception, twenty artists have created works that are humorous, bizarre, and made from nearly every conceivable medium. This work […]
Knowing and direct, in this self-portrait Newcastle artist Norma Allen (1918-1998) peers intently into a round mirror. Her face is solid, posed against abstract shapes of green and blue. Struck by her gaze, we gaze back. Painted in 1959, Mirror: Self-Portrait was a finalist in the 1960 Archibald Prize, the premier award for portraiture in […]
When speaking of his uncle, Maurice O’Shea, the Sydney-based artist Garry Shead (1942-) shows great admiration. According to Garry, his childhood memories of annual visits to O’Shea’s renowned Mount Pleasant vineyard in Pokolbin in the Hunter Valley recall ‘a cultured man who loathed pretension and arrogance’. Along with his thick glasses worn to rectify severe […]
Described as a ‘painters painter’, Lucy Culliton has been a finalist in several Archibald, Wynne and Sulman art prizes, marking her as one of Australia’s leading representational contemporary painters. Known for her depictions of found object assemblages, landscapes, and portraits of people and animals, art critic John McDonald described her work as being a ‘perfect […]
Strip searches, ‘shut downs’ and cell raids, such as when kitchen knives went missing, frequently sparked hostility and violence among the prisoners of Maitland Gaol, interrupting the calm. As warder Keith Bush remembered: ‘… everybody’s talking, singing, yelling out, screaming at each other… People are just snarling at you, giving you filthy looks.’ In this […]
Known affectionately as the ‘first Clown Prince of Australian country music…’, Chad Morgan was inducted into the Australian Country Music Roll of Renown in 1987. His colourful career as a unique entertainer and ‘larrikin’ country singer began in 1952 as a finalist on the Australia’s Amateur Hour radio show. A subsequent recording contract delivered his […]
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