Daniel Thomas : Newspaper writings

r three years has well and truly come to life in Sydney as nowhere else in Australia. Here we have a Potters' Society. whose exhibitions may soon become annual events. No other city ap- parently has one. Here we have the only specialist journal, Pottery in Austra !a, now In Its second year. and with its fourth issue lust out 15/ per copy. subscriptions etc. to the editor. 30 Turra- murra Ave., Turramurra). licre an audience of 400 crowded to hear a lecture 10 days ago by Peter Rush - forth, in charge of pottery at the National Art School. and just back from a visit to Japan. Besides his classes there has for some years been the teaching at the famous Stunt craft centre at Mitts - gong. at first under Ivan McMeekin. more recently under Lea Blakebrough. Mid besides thta all the local potters seem to be ' taking off for study tripe to Japan. one of the world's great centres of ceramic art. And they have attracted return visits from potters living in Japan, like the American Fred Olsen whose sophisticated work was seen at Barry Stern's a fortnight ago, or like the New Zealander John Chappell who will be et Stunt next year. Most of our potters then have good. solid back- groond where Melbourne ones for example are in- clined to be self-taught and isolated from each other. And unlike the recently seen gay Picassoid super- ficialities of Adelaide's Leckie. or the unhappy at- tempts to upgrade them- selves into sculptors of Melbourne's Sanders (and our own. or Wollongong's Ivan Englund - though both are fine potters) most of the local potters keep to the serious mainstreams of ceramic art. The consequence of all this fertile activity is a conviction that Pottery has really got off the ground. And maybe because It also respects the craft traditions and the formal traditions the results can be aesthetically more satis- factory as sculpture than most of the "free" art the current sorry Sculptors' Society show. Pockley and Sahm "TELEGRAPH" dney, N.S.W. 19 SUNDAY TELEGRAPH, NOVEMBER 24, 1963 91 The Week in Art by Daniel Thomas POTTERY IT'S COME TO LIFE IN SYDNEY OTTERY in two or ttratlY more substantial talent than one realised from the single pictures scattered in various mixed shows She looks like a Feuer - ring pupil with her rich plastery textured paint sur- faces. The approach is con- sistent, the mood, lyrical though usually low -tined, and she is at her be. in the intimate world of still-life bottle; rather than nowers, bur their solidity sults her softened cubism. But since this is just one of many pleasant -enough painting shows, and since one of the very best of our few potters is downstairs, Bernard Sahm is the main attraction. Sahm's basic forms for his gritty stoneware have not changed since his show last year-sturdy deep bowls, and tall narrow vases 01 crisply superimposed con- cave elements. The forms however. are both subtler and more com- plex, and they have acquir- ed the most satisfactory painted decoration seen on any pots in years. Fully integrated with the struc- ture of the vessels, usually brown. it may refer back to Archaic Greek or Middle Eastern pottery decoration. (It should remind one to revisit the Nicholson Mus- eum at the University of Sydney, much too little- known to the general pub- lic, where there are superb "Grecian Urns." row upon row. But first check whe- ther It Is open, which is seldom.) Sahm's pots are priced uupp to 20 guineas. Next Tuesday at the Hungry Horse Marco Gerrard, half -Greek herself, will also be showing pots. And an official survey exhibi- tion of Australian and New Zealand Pottery, due in Sydney in the middle of next year, will be at the Newcastle City Art .Gal - It was the curator in charge of ceramics at the National Gallery of Vic- toria who this week point- ed out to me the super- iority of Sydney's pottery. If Melbourne lacks prac- tising potters, at least its art museum has a pottery curator: and. where Syd- ney ho only three, Mel- bourne has a curatorial staff of seven. plus a team of education officers. The reason for Mel- bourne being given staff that can attempt to serve Its public is due most of all to the glamor of the 00 - year -old Felton Bequest At Barry Stern's Lesley with which many master- Pockley's one-man show of pieces have been bought paintings reveals a dis- for the National Gallery POTTERY . of Victoria. for a total of £1,237,000. A new book The Fel- ton Bequest (OUP 42/I by Sir Daryl Lindsay, a last director of the Gal- ery. is rather scrappily put together. It is pri- marily an administrative history, and perhaps of little interest to the gen- eral reader. It does however stress that the collection would have been infinitely bet- ter if the Gallery Trustees had only placed confidence in their expert advisers, that is their director, and their London buyer. Felton Bequest For example Sir Sidney Colvin (a most distin- guished scholar) after only two years' buying and the rejection of im- portant Renoir, Manet, Mtge.% Constable and Tur- ner paintings rest ned In 1915 saying: "Finally as a matter of parting advice to your committee, I would urge them in all serious- ness and courtesy to rea- lise that neither I nor any other recognised or competent judge of paint- ing would consent to ad- vise them in the absence of such confidence as they have hitherto not thought proper to extend to me. and as my known position gives me - I consider - the right to expect." . be Sahm Sir Daryl drops some other surreptitious bombs amongst his suggestions for the Melbourne Gal- liar page he praises the lery's welfare. The Orien- judgment of the present tai collection (the special Felton buyer, Mr. McDon- favorite of the present ne ll, in old masters, but chairman of trustees) he.is decidedly lukewarm - thinks nearly perfect, and 'bout his contemporary that therefore it would be purchases. most unwise to extend It The book also contains at the expense of the other photographs of selected collections. And in view Felton Trustees, and of 40 of the scarcity and ex- selected Felton purchases. pease of good old master All concerned with public paintings he feels that art museums should read buying should now be it. mainly directed to content -1 porary works; on an ear- . WHAt'S ON TODAY AND NEX1 WEEK Art Gellere d N.S.W.: Special A10140,.., Painting .der, prior to Euronn four. ALL NEXT WEEK Koine,Rued &en a re: "Pr enen Terry Clone: 1.110.4lId HetsIne. Berry Stern: Lesiay Pecaley, eeinlinee: Bernard SO,. poop's. Walk Celery. Henna,: Ida Esuckketwer. wildflower Pel4tillesi V., derloock Newcastle: IS ovine.. end end*, Laws. Derlinehunt: L Hegedus. J. Janke. Newcastle CIO An Geller,: TAA Office, Elleabeth Street: faction for Nallenal Tr,al euction. OPENING TUESDAY CrZ." mo7T It Dr. 59111y.7 L7 1:1Arer; Collection. a Dominion: Ronald Kirke. nd R. enIteeHre OPENING WEDNESDAY g3 'eV:1Zr o:;;II,Zeri"Irwr, Mdr Illeeet, The Orden Studio. THURSDAY LECTURE Welke !Moat. S pcw, Modern. A In .. Dlianlyg Serwitures. meirtmlortbsMMAINIMMIONOW.1111.1411.1.11111111111101 iiiiii 1.111,5