Queensland Art Gallery Presscuttings Book 8 : Pressclippings, 1977-1981

The · Wolter Burley Griffin exhibition which ends this week at the Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbone, feature, o 1919 design for o R.S.L. Club here: o project never t arried to frui– tion. Griffin, a great pioneer of Australian ar– chitecture, won first prize in a world-wide competition for a design for Canberra and was also an associate of Frank Lloyd Wright in America. Griffin thought of himself as a "naturalist" in architecture. He en– visaged building GRIFFIN ON SHOW ma1erial, finished struc– ture and landscape as one entity. His R.S. L. Club design for Toowoomba reflecls this outlook as it not only gives an impres– sion of simplici1y of line and solidity of structure, but the building appears to blend with the sur– rounding landscape and shows a cenlral open trellised beer-garden as well as an impressive curved front facadc. The Australian land– scape also plays an im– portan1 role in some of the old prints now on view at rca1ivc 9 Gallery, Margarel Street. Two "after George French Angas", Cl847, are views of lhc Barossa Valley. A copper engraving of Captain Cook's visit 10 Tahiti during his second voyage to the southern hemisphere, C 1794, is of special interest to collec– tors and historians . - P.K. EXCITEME_NT GENERATED Ex~itemen~ is_generate~ by the Australian landscape, as well as by figures and animals within that selling, for four young artists whose exhibition opens al the Downs Gallery and Arts Centre next Friday . · Clara Mali , Glen Pustcr, Ian Lee and Gayle Pollard arc friends, hav. studied I gc1 hcr and share com– mon interests. Thus 1hcir ceramics, scu lp111rc, pho1ography and pain– tings rcflccl a certain harmony or feeling . Clara will exhibit about 70 pieces of pol• tery, many arc func- 1ional and of pumpkin and animal forms . Her early wild life pieces, such as elephants, arc akin to Africa, bu1 her newer pieces, small, fic- 1itious carica1urcs, show an clement or humour and arc inspired t y goannns, geckos, and donkeys in 1he lllnn– chvicw area . ,\n animal chess set is or white s1oncwnre and blue and brown oxides. Her low– fired pots arc in a varic1y of tolours: her high- fired rcduclion glazes arc in cream, blue and ton toning,. Ceramics will also be displayed b y Gle n Pus1cr. Func1ional p01, such us planter and can– islcrs, as well as fan– ciful animal creatures, arc in burr and while raku stoneware. Olen also has a collection or abou1 10 acrylic pain– tings in slrong colours where lhe figure and landscape arc used as departing points for im– aginative, scmi-abstracl co mposi1ion s. His sculp1urcs are a devclop– mcnl , a scaling-down and necessary ndapta– lion, or lhosc seen in his earlier s how or November, 1978, at the D.D.I.A.E. foyer . He explores 1hc pos ibilitics or fibreglass, m~tal and fabric forms in space and achieves a successful AROUND THE GALLERIES 1ension be1wcen illusion and reality a dreamlike crrcc1 (one is pic1ured at right) . About 30 pho1ographs will be shown by Inn Lee . Here human figures, both native and white. and lhc land– scape, arc rea1urcd . Gayle Pollard, who has n Diploma of Arn (Crcalive) from 1hc D.D.I.A.E., is now SIU· dying for a Diploma or Education at Wagga . She pain1s euch week in Sydney and will show a varie1y or works rdlc - ting her developing abstrncl vision. Although see n m nn } Aus1ralian land ~ a pe paintings. colonial por- 1raiturc has been largely overlooked by scholars and 1he public alike. l·lowcvcr. a group or colonial portrails is on show m the Queensland Arl Gallery, Brisbane, umil June 6. Sevcmy works arc from collcc– t ion s throughout Australia and include paimings by artists such as George French Angas. S.T. Gill. Joseph Fowles and lhc convict artists, Joseph Dacklcr, Thomas Bock, William Gould and Thomas G. Waincwrigh1. or special intcre s1 to Quecnslandcrs arc the works or Augus1us Earle. His portrai1 of Sir Thomas Brisbane, whic hangs in Government House, Sydney, is the earliest commissioned pniming by Australian colonists or one of their governors.