Embracing the contradictions inherent in public art collections and exploring the uses to which they are put.
Chaos & Order celebrates over 80 Australian and international artists in an ambitious survey of the RMIT Art Collection.
LEFT: Airborne. 1-9 2008, gold leaf and pigment on paper. 9 panels 60 x 75 cm each.
Artists including Tate Adams, Howard Arkley, Khadim Ali, Peter Booth, Polly Borland, Godwin Bradbeer, Rupert Bunny, Penny Byrne, Maria Fernanda Cardoso, Peter Clarke, Michael Cook, Len Crawford, Daniel Crooks, Craig Easton, Peter Ellis, Neil Emmerson, Juan Ford, Hayden Fowler, Len French, Sally Gabori, Bill Henson, Petr Herel, Clare Humphries, Robert Hunter, Robert Jacks, Sam Jinks, George Johnson, Roger Kemp, Inge King, Grahame King, Juz Kitson, Grace Lillian Lee, Helen Maudsley, Nick Mourtzakis, Trevor Nickolls, Jill Orr, Polixeni Papapetrou, Susan Philipsz, Anthony Pryor, Reko Rennie, Yhonnie Scarce, Greg Semu, Jan Senbergs, Christian Thompson, Kawita Vatanajyankur, Ah Xian.
1 exhibition; 125 artists; 5 venues.
Each of the Melbourne exhibition spaces has selected work that demonstrates its particular curatorial practice and aesthetic, with artists from around Australia working in a variety of materials and formats. Such diversity reflects the range of contemporary interests in Abstract / Non-Objective art. Practitioners with decades of experience and recent graduates celebrating together its innovative vitality, its freshness and longevity. In 1968, the National Gallery of Victoria opened its new St Kilda Road home. A major architectural and cultural emblem to highlight the maturity and strength of the nation's burgeoning artistic ambition.
THE FIELD exhibition of contemporary Australian abstraction affirmed our aspirations for an international context. It was a significant choice for the opening of this new cultural institution. The built form of the NGV could be considered 'modernist sombre' while THE FIELD itself was 'energetic excess'. Restraint meets exuberance. A magnificent balance.
In 2018, the NGV celebrates 50 years in St Kilda Road with THE FIELD REVISITED. More than a restaging of the breakout exhibition; it is a retelling of a great moment in a long story.
and grand re-examinations of artistic cul-de-sacs. All manner of aesthetic polemics and political postures are reified and re-contextualised to make and mark works that advancethe action beyond novelty of the new.
Coney Island - Catalogue: see page 3.
​Wilma Tabacco's capacity for flawless hard-edge painting has been honed in a practice that spans thirty years. In the studio, smaller studies for works consist of cardboard components, that are shuffled into different configurations. The painted line surfaces differently in her works: at times in fine vertical vibrations, at others in highly pronounced block form. Dan Rule observes how, "Tabacco's painted surfaces aren't nearly as flat as their first read. With proximity, their patina and the play of the brush become far more complex."4 Both Sesame and Hatchepsut are loosely drawn from the aerial view of archaeological sites. The scale of the works prompts figurative allusions and the artist freely asserts that many of her works are based on observations harnessed from reality.
In these new works I have used the cyrillic alphabet letters that 'spell' Malevich as the basis for compositions intended as referents to his paintings. This year marks the 100th anniversary of his prototype drawing for the iconic painting Black Square and this exhibition commemorate his visionary ideas.