Daniel Thomas : Newspaper writings

SUNDAY TELEGRAPH, AUGUST 19, 1962 IAN FAIRWEATHER and Godfrey Miller are b o th around 70. Together this week their authoritative horde of Sydney's younger presence has stilled the noisy artists. Fairweather's annual one - man show of paintings opened at the Macquarie Gal- leries, and a beautiful book of Miller's draw- ings was published by Edwards and Shaw. Not many painters in Australia (or anywhere?) improve with age. To do so might be a test of great- ness. Either we have had them compromising their art into a readily saleable com- modity as did Streeton, or we have had them settling into an honest craftsman- sh < Society of Artists' ein middle -age. ex ibition is showing work of this kind at present from men like Carington Smith and Arthur Murch. Or we have had a vir- tual abandonment of painting for teaching or other official work; but, unless a constant pressure is maintained ground seems to be lost, a deeper.- ing and enrichment noes not seem to take place. Fairweather and Miller are, besides, highly Intel- lectual men. Both have travelled in the East and studied the philosophies and literatures of the World. A taste for such funda- mental brainwork cannot help but strengthen their art, and may indeed be necessary for greatness. For the past decade Fairweather's annual ex- hibitions have been the most dependably high ex- perience in the whole of Australian art. With Mil- ler, and Pasamore too, who both, unlike Fairweather, Nee and teach in Sydney, a standard of true quality has been set, and this has been of incalculable bene- fit to the now flourishing younger school of Sydney pauinting If nothing by Fairwea- ther la quite so perfect as last year's "Monastery" ("Xenophobia" is close) there is this time, an add- ed largeness of scale. The over life-size heads, dense and monumental in "Por- trait of the Artist." "The Sisters" and "Night Life" recur in the several com- partments of "Epiphany." These are witnesses of the ultimate mysteries and aware of it. They swell with compassion. "Monsoon," another superb large painting, is also dark and sombre. Its windswept calligraphy, and the grey "Mangrove," re- mind one how a painter must draw on his visual and physical experience as well as his emotions and his intellect. Somehow one imagines that the earth, the sky, and the vegetation around his Queensland studio must be exactly like this. To set against the pre- dominant mood of deep seriousness there is the straight -forward gaiety of "Chinatown" and there are a couple of pictures in his more familiar linear cubist idiom, "Centaurus Lupus." and "Reclining Figure." The last has a richness of color-grey, pink, light blue and green-and of rhythm in line and space, which gives a lyrical eleg- ance and profound charm comparable with Braque. The general public has for the first time become aware of Fairweather this year. There is a pedestrian traffic Jam in the small which is the master- piece?" Godfrey Mill' "FORTY Drawings by Godfrey Miller" (Ed- wards and Shaw, 3gns.) in fact contains 45 drawings. There is a sympathetic foreword by Hen- shaw. Then the drawings are divided into three sec- tions: early Slade School drawings, a middle section from perhaps 10 years ago (the first of these, an ex- ceptionally lovely stand- ing figure, must have been the first public indication of Miller's presence among us when it was published in 1948) and, finally, the bulk of the illustrations are appar- ently quite recent. All are drawings of the nude. The artists discov- ery of truth in an increas- ingly confusing world has come from a serene mn- temptation of nature, and from an awareness of its rhythms and their flux. These can be expressed admirably by the nude, a figure positioned in space, but part of it, and subject to it and its forces. At a time when there Is a fashion for spontaneity and freshness in art, for the sketch rather than the classic composition, there could be some who will prefer these marvellous drawings to Godfrey Mil- ler's elaborated paintings. The book is very well designed and printed. For both content and presenta- tion there has been noth- ing of equal importance in Australian art publishing for a long time. Exhibitions THE Society of Artists IL at the Education De- partment Galleries, and the Australian Watercolor Institute at David Jones, are holding their annual exhibitions. The first has, for many years, aimed to set the highest professional stan- dards and It is true that the best conservative painting in Australia is to be found here. There a acts notably Gilliland, Hodgkinson and Coburn with one of his new spa - 0014 paetures. Fairweather's "Centaurus Lupus" gallery, and crowds asking But the civilised women, Enid Cambridge, Thea Proctor, Grace Cossington Smith, Jean Appleton, and the urbane men, Lloyd Rees, and Bill Salmon, typify the Society with their accomplished figura- tion. They do not go be- yond the best domes t I c virtues, but this indeed is much. The Watercolor Institute does not have quite the same solidity. Here t h e outstanding work is Henry Salkauskas' abstract, and the predominating conser- vatism is well seen in the work of Alfred Cook and Enid Cambridge. J o e Roses pleasant watercolors are a surprise after his oils. Mixed shoivs relVVO dealers have mixed 1- shows. The Dominion Gallery shows five paintings each by six artists, Cobb Plug- elman. Ogburn,Talbert, Renshaw (the 1956 N.S.W. Government Scholarship winner, whose work has not been seen in such bulk before) and Gould (greatly liberated over the last year or so). The Terry Clune Gallery has some of the very beat of our younger painters and this is an exhibition to visit after the Fairwea- ther show. The same magic of true art, though very different in kind, is found in a large mew painting by John Olsen. "People in the You Beaut Country" is a richly popu- lated blue and purple noc- turne, one would imagine about pub-closing time in Paddington. Olsen also has some .pastels, and, there is good work by Coburn, Cas- sab. Morrow and Janet Dawson. It is particularly inter- esting to see Hodgitinson's "Outside the Landscape." for his Wills prize-winning picture was an upright version of it, reduced in size to suit the competi- tion's size limits, and less iond hterehan exhi thebited. larger ver- s The Idea of size limita- tion has now been tested once or twice. It seemed a good idea after the mas- sive rejections at a certain Easter Show, when a few enormous paintings filled all available space. But it has resulted In monotonous exhibitions, and has obviously cramped the artists. The idea might now be scrapped. r- WHAT'S ON TODAY AND NEXT WEEK Art Gallery of N.S.W.: Special Exhibition-Helena Rubinstein Travelling Art Scholarship. ALL NEXT WEEK Macquarie: Ian Fairweather. Education Department Gallery: Society of Artiste Spring Exhibition. David Jones: Watercolor Institute. Terry ciune: Fifth Anniversary Show. Kamen: Jon Molvig. Sydney University Gallery: Paintings by Dr. J. W. Power. Dominion: Six Painters. OPENING WEDNESDAY Barry Stern: Eva Kubbos. Farmers: Roger Kemp. TUESDAY LECTURE Painting demonstration by John Olsen, Contem- porary Art 8o tear Hall, Bligh 'Street. 8 p.to , AY LECTURE Panel discussion on Rubinstein Scholarship, Art Gallery of Na.W., 8.15 p.m.