Under a Modern Sun: Art in Queensland 1930s–1950s

Kenneth Macqueen , (Great Barrier Reef) (detail) c.1938 Art critic Dr Gertrude Langer inspecting a local art show, Brisbane, April 1940 Vida Lahey , Art and nature 1934 Vida Lahey , Hibiscus, gerbera and russelia 1936 the advancement of art, as Mayo described, ‘in every shape and form’. 7 During the life of the QAF, 50 works by British and Australian artists, such as George Clausen and Rupert Bunny, were acquired and presented to the Gallery. From 1934 to 1935, Mayo, in particular, worked tirelessly for the QAF, suspending her own practice to secure the £10,000 needed to match the amount offered under the terms of the John Darnell Bequest, with £15,000 of the total going to the Queensland National Art Gallery. 8 In 1936, the artists’ endeavours attracted the support of the New York-based Carnegie Corporation, which subsequently sponsored the establishment of the Queensland Art Library (QAL). Comprising books, colour reproductions and photographs, the QAL was administered by Lahey and provided a rich resource for Brisbane artists and the public, as did her weekly lectures. 9 On the Darling Downs, Kenneth Macqueen brought a contemporary eye to the Australian landscape tradition with crisp, clear watercolours that reflected his commitment to a modernist aesthetic. Macqueen settled on his property near Millmerran following active service in France during World War One, having studied at the Slade School of Fine Art in London after the war. Drawing on ideas he absorbed at the Slade, Macqueen simplified the forms he encountered while farming and on family holidays at the seaside, finding pattern and design in nature. Notably, he travelled to the Great Barrier Reef, which — through publications such as Clem Christesen’s Queensland Journey: Official Guide of the Queensland Government Tourist Bureau (c.1939) — was starting to enter the public imagination as a holiday destination. 10 Though Macqueen exhibited sporadically with the RQAS, showing more frequently with the Society of Artists and the Contemporary Group in Sydney, he nonetheless maintained contact with his Brisbane‑based contemporaries, including William Bustard, whose paintings of the Darling Downs reveal an affinity with Macqueen’s work. In the state’s north, South Australian painter Noel Wood was inspired by the verdant landscapes he encountered when he moved to Doorila Cove on Bedarra Island in 1936. Wood quickly established a reputation for the light-infused paintings he made of the atoll. When he showed his scenes of the tropical north in group exhibitions, including at Melbourne’s Australian Art Academy in 1939, he found a ready audience. The following year, Wood enjoyed further success with a joint exhibition he held with Roy Dalgarno at the Princes Ballroom in the Courier Building in Brisbane’s Queen Street. Designer and entrepreneur Olive Ashworth would visit Lindeman Island at this time, and again in the early 1950s, to gather ideas for a series of tourist brochures advertising the Great Barrier Reef; she subsequently produced fabric designs inspired by the Reef, which were sold worldwide. Significantly, 1939 saw the arrival in Brisbane of Viennese art historian and scholar Dr Gertrude Langer, who brought with her a deep and considered understanding of modern European art and Asian art. Langer soon became a vocal advocate for, and constructive critic of, the work of Queensland artists through her lectures on art appreciation, which she presented for the QAL and in the Toowong home she shared with her architect husband Dr Karl Langer, and later in her role as art critic for the Courier-Mail . 11