Queensland Art Gallery Annual Report 1995-96

D I R E C T O R ' S REPORT The 1995-96 component of the Gallery's centenary year was Modernism: Asian Modernism: Australian Modernism' as a particularly rewarding with a diverse and focused exhibition year 2000 event. program, including touring exhibitions to regional Queensland; substantial development of the Collection, in particular the The Centenary Collection now comprises works by Australian, establishment of the Centenary Collection; community European and Asian artists - thirty-three individual works and celebrations; and innovative intellectual and interpretive programs. one series of twenty-one works. Twenty works were acquired through a special allocation from the Queensland Government, Over 3 000 people loined the Gallery in celebrating its centenary twelve through Queensland A r t Gallery Foundation grants or at the Centenary Open Day in December. With its performances, gifts, one with funds from the International Exhibitions Program behind-the-scenes tours, displays and decorations, this day was one and one as a gift from the Queensland A r t Gallery Society. of the Gallery's most successful initiatives in the area of audience participation and access. In the collection area of Prints, Drawings & Photographs, over one hundred separate works by thirty-nine artists, mainly from Of the exhibitions presented in-house throughout the year, the Fluxus movement, were gifted by Francesco Conz, one of the ten focused on the Gallery's Collection, three exclusively featured world's leading publishers of avant-garde art editions and Queensland artists, four were touring Australian art exhibitions multiples. Representing the most important individual donation and there were three Gallery 14 installations, including one by an of international art to the Gallery, the gift also included important international artist. documentary photographs and publications for the Library's research collection. In addition, the Gallery established a video Centenary highlights were 'Australian Colonial Art: 1800-1900', from art collection, which is unique in Australia. the Art Gallery of South Australia, which was presented free of admission charges due to the generous sponsorship of Santos; the A fifteen percent increase in the Gallery's Indigenous Australian art focus on Brisbane's art and artists of the 1950s to 1970s, 'A Time holdings has occurred since the appointment of the Curator of Remembered: Art in Brisbane 1950 to 1975', sponsored by the Indigenous Australian A r t in June 1995, giving greater historic Bank of Queensland; tribute surveys of the work of Queensland depth and balance to the previously more urban-based collection sculptors Leonard and Kathleen Shillam and potter Gwyn Hanssen which had been the strength developed from the 'Balance 1990: Pigott; the focus on the developing contemporary Indigenous Views, Visions, Influences' exhibition. Mick Namarari Tjapaltjarri's Australian collection in the 'Pathways I - Changes and Exchanges...' Bush tucker story 1972, an icon of Indigenous Australian desert art, exhibition; and the exhibition celebrating the centenary of was purchased at auction and has immeasurably enriched the Lloyd Rees's birth, 'Lloyd Rees Drawings: Centenary Retrospective' Gallery's holdings of desert art. from the Art Gallery of New South Wales. The three exhibitions focusing on Queensland art and artists were curated by the Contemporary Australian art acquisitions were dominated by Gallery's Curator of Decorative Arts, who is to be congratulated works of Queensland artists. The range of works, including four on this major contribution, installations, reflects the complex variety of media in contemporary art practice. The fourth exhibition in the biennial 'Reference Points' More than 300 000 people visited the Gallery's 'Matisse' exhibition series again highlighted recent contemporary art acquisitions. during its three-venue tour, which opened at the Queensland Art The Education Section's public response program, where visitors Gallery on its centenary day, 29 March 1995, and closed at the were invited to provide a response to, or critique of, works National Gallery of Victoria on 3 September. The exhibition displayed in the exhibition, proved an innovative and valuable attracted unprecedented critical acclaim, making this centenary interpretive program that will be a model for future programs. exhibition one of the Gallery's most successful projects in a scholarly, artistic and popular sense. The complex restoration of the Gallery's first identified piece of Queensland colonial furniture, the Glengallan sideboard (1868), Planning for the Second Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, was completed by the Workshop Coordinator. Returned to its which opens in September 1996, was significant. The Gallery hosted former glory, this rare and historically significant piece was a an international forum with fifty-five participants to discuss welcome addition to the presentation of the Australian decorative development of the 1996 event and fifteen curatorial teams travelled arts collection in the centenary year. throughout the region, resulting in the final selection of artists, catalogue writers and conference speakers. The Triennial - with its An outstanding Souvenir book on the Collection, including centenary visitor programs, conference, publications, documentary films, acquisitions, was produced and launched in June. Publications in research database, education and public programs - places the a variety of formats were also produced to complement both Gallery at the forefront of Australian cultural links and dialogue in-house and travelling exhibitions. A book on Australian art in the with Asia and the Pacific. Collection, which will include new research, is currently in progress. Also in the area of international art exhibitions, the Queensland Service to regional Queensland audiences included three touring Art Gallery began collaboration with the National Gallery of exhibitions of works from the Collection - the nine-venue tour Australia as the only other Australian venue for the 1997 exhibition of 'Ancient Land, Modern Art: An Exhibition of Contemporary 'Paris: In the Late 19th Century', and has announced that it will Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Art' and the seven-venue curate the major exhibitions 'Whistler' for 1999 and 'European tour of 'The Spiritual and the Social: Nine Artists from Thailand,