Daniel Thomas : Newspaper writings

By DANIEL THOMAS RICHARD L ARTER'S paintings have appeared at Watters almost every year for eight years. They haven't been noticed as much as their excellence de- serves because they were inde- pendent of general movements in Australian art. (Their con- Mections are with English Pop, :for Larter arrived in Sydney !from England in 1962 already la mature artist, yet still young.) Isolated, independent artists always seem to be overlooked, even when they are as ener- getically productive as Larter and as regular at exhibiting, and even when the paintings have such visual dazzle plus startling imagery. Many of his collage-struc- ture figurative images come out of European pornographic magazines, or comic strips, and they are juxtaposed with faces one knows from newspapers, like Gorton and Askin and Germaine Greer. Yet these shock-tactic images are only half the story. They are, I think, only a super- ficial reminder that underneath the representational images of power, energy, violence and so on, there is a much more im- portant kind of energy and power, namely abstract, formal relationships of line and shape and colour. In fact half the new exhibi- tion at Watters is, as usual, completely abstract paintings, rather like dazzling lights. Further, it seems that Larter Ifeels more secure than pre- viously; he perhaps feels that at last he has a small audience that understands him, so he ' can relax a little. He has in- dulged himself with extremely delicate, dotted veils of pule colour. whose sheer beauty dominates the porno imagery. He is at once strong and deli- cate, like Seurat. It is an ad- mirable combination. * * * Ewa Pachucka's "Imprints in Paint", at the Rudy Komon Gallery, are paintings which make much use of repetition. r IN=M11=11=1181MMIERNIB NEW EXHIBITIONS Watters: Paintings by Richard Larter. Rudy Komon: Paintings by Ewa Pachucka. Burton Street: Paintings and drawings by Verdon Morcom. Macquarie Canberra: Sculptures by Ante Dabro. Holdsworth: Paintings by Margaret 011ey. Soho: Paintings by Reinis Zusters, Eva Kubbos, Henry Sal- kauskas, Isto Jakola. Lord of the Rings: Sculpture and jewellery by Jacques Wen - grow. Trinity Delmar: Spring exhibition. Bonython: Paintings by Sidney Nolan; Ceramics by Milton Moon (tomorrow). Workshon Arts Centre: Students' sculpture, jewellery, mosaics k Monday). Hogarth: Etchings by Salvador Dali (Tuesday). Near -identical ape -man heads confront each, other, bare their teeth, attempt some sign -lan- guage. Figures are revealed in- side figures; or, rather, women, specifically, are sliced open to reveal more people inside. Ewa Pachucka is Polish, has lived in Australia since 1970, and those who know East European animated film will find the tormented imagery familiar enough. Yet if these smudgy, textured paintings are perhaps rather conven- tional in themselves, they do enlarge our idea of the surely very original weavings which all Sydney had seen prev- iously from this artist. The rough sisal or coir weavings were of empty human skins. Sometimes the skins had not yet achieved human form. So her rudimen- tary people are waiting to he filled with still imperfectly developed humanity. The mes- sage is apparently that we are the product of all other people, totally interdependent, and in no way independent. * * * Margaret 011ey fills the Holdsworth Gallery with 48 good-sized still lifes and inter- iors. The interiors were painted in what is recognisably the late David Strachan's house, and although still life subjects like orange branches, or bowls of pears, could be chosen by any- one, they were once painted by Strachan and one can't help thinking of him. Certainly the two artists were friends, they painted together in Syd- ney and Brisbane and 2aris, but except for their subjects, their paintings are, after all, very different. 011ey's work is now decisive (I don't think it always was) whereas Strachan's was end- lessly exploratory and tenta- tive; hers has an effect of monochrome whereas his reveals itself as filled with sparkling colour. And even the subjects are approached differ- ently: his fruit or wildflowers become timeless, generalised images of the beauty to be found in simple things; hers are more particularised, even dramatised, to celebrate the great variety of the fruit of the Australian earth. * * * Lord of th Rings is a craft gallery, apparent.y confined to jewellery in silver. It opened unobtrusive!" three months ago in the one-time opal gal- lery in Glenmore Road op- posite Barry Stern. When I chanced upon it last week there was a one-man show by the Hemmingsens, and a selec- "MORNING HERALD" Sydney, N.S.W. tion of work by the dozen craftsmen who were in the gallery's inaugural exhibition. Frank Bauer's was the most original, and the most sculp- tural to admire in a showcase; when worn it doesn't rest on the body but instead appears to pierce it in a fashionably sadomasochistic, thumbscrew way. Bauer is pretty good. Antiquarian is a print gal- lery, also opposite Barry Stern, and although it has never held special exhibitions or otherwise made itself noticeable, it is well worth knowing about. It always has a good stock of old topographical and natural history engravings of the kind that were often originally book illustrations. There are also some nineteenth century artists' etchings of the kind that syere made as independent works of art. * * * The Burton Street Gallery, 33 Burton Street, Darling- hurst, next door to the one- time Jerry van Beek Gallery, has now been in existence quite a few months, but still hasn't had an exhibition I ' could really recommend. Cur- rently there are paintings by Verdon Morcom. The gallery is efficiently run, there are invitations and catalogues with biographical notes, and I notice that Mor- com, who has been a maga- zine and advertising illustra- tor, is now a television graphics artist. I now wonder whether all the Burton Street exhibi- tions have been by commercial artists moving into serious painting. They have all been good, facile draughtsmen, with little interest in colour or com- position or subject matter. Maybe the gallery should show these artists' drawings or even their photographs, in- stead of their paintings. Mor- corn's paintings, anyway, are virtually drawings. They are touristy views of pleasant parts of Sydney and Europe; they would be decorative souvenirs of the places, and they are quite harmless. L J