Vew from the chair: Speeches of Richard WL Austin

It is also no different in that those who appraise and collect art will make more mistakes than inspired choices, in exactly the same way as did their predecessors. Yet to ignore contemporary art is obviously unrealistic. To attempt to direct the path that art will take may be the easiest course in the short run, but in the long run is the most parochial and cowardly. The challenge and the rewards lie in trying to understand and accept, and to move intellectually and emotionally in the direction of adventurous works, rather than to reject those which do not match the views we may already hold. Even at the risk of abject failure, the young and emerging artist must never fail to be adventurous, never be afraid of his canvas or his brush. Sir Winston Churchill-who, as well as being a brave soldier and an inspiring leader of men, was a painter of no mean order-advocated this boldness in an evocative paragraph in one of his lesser known books called Painting as a Pastime. I shall quote this paragraph in full, because I take the view that if something has been well put by a master of the English language, no advantage is gained by trying to recreate the image or the idea in one's own, almost certainly less felicitous, prose: Very gingerly I mixed a little blue paint on the palette with a very small brush and then with infinite precautions made a mark about as big as a bean upon the affronted snow white canvas. It was a challenge, a deliberate challenge, but so subdued, so halting, indeed, so cataleptic, that it deserved no response. At that moment the loud approaching sound of a motor car was heard in the drive. From this chariot there stepped swiftly and lightly none other than the gifted wife of Sir John Lavery. [Sir John Lavery was President of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters at that time.] 'Painting, I see, but what are you hesitating about', she said. 'Let me have a brush-a big one'. Splash into the turpentine, wallop into the blue and the white, frantic flourish on the palette-clean no longer-and then several large fierce strokes and slashes of blue on the absolutely cowering canvas. Anyone could see that it could not hit back. No evil fate avenged the jaunty violence. The canvas grinned in helpless-ness before me. The spell was broken. The sickly inhibitions rolled away. I seized the largest brush and fell upon my victim with berserk fury. I have never felt any awe of a canvas since. The young painters represented in this exhibition are clearly not in awe of their canvases or their brushes either. Their works are, for the most part, full of energy and unexpected new and exciting insight. They are evidence, not only of hard work and commitment, but also of a readiness-even an eagerness-to challenge existing art traditions and to be adventurous with their medium. It is pleasing to see the large number of Queensland artists represented, as this signals that the visual arts in this State are very much alive and well. It is clear that Churchie has played no small part in producing this renaissance. It was one of the first schools to realise the need for an artistic dimension in people's lives and therefore in the curriculum. As long ago as 1957 a valiant effort was made to initiate this, but the time was still not right and it failed. As the author of the school history, The Making of Men-which I have read with interest-rather sadly puts it, 'Another twenty-five years would elapse before art was taken seriously at Churchie'. 1 Well, not quite twenty-five years, because in 1971 George Petelin was appointed to take charge of the new art school, even though it did not yet have permanent accommodation. Petelin was an inspired choice because he was a rounded man. 105