Wieneke Archive Book 4d : Artists - Australian & Other Presscuttings

sed iota ours. In Between The Lines ,Hole In The Wall Theatre, Perth) author Marcus Cooney has used Law n's correspondence e as starting point for play and says: "The -,tipreme compliment for me will be if nobody can ecognise where Lawson ends and Cooney begins. There was no way to tackle the problem if I wanted to stay true to the mars" It appears to me that Mr Cooney has succeeded bolliantly in his ambi- tion. Fur in this play Ifeney Lawson comes across as a omen being, not a legend. He was a sad and lonely man whose desperate shyness apparently lay at the root of his disastrous in- ability to formulate rela- tionships with others. 111111110.M.MI A combination of his Scandinavian heritage his family name was Larsen), his hard life on its father's farm, his ,tcanty education, his parents' separation, would seem to provide the clas- sic background for his tortured later life: indeed they resulted in a broken marriage and alcoholism but produced a prodigious literary talent and a sar- donic realism that has Yet to be equalled in Australian writing. His knowledge and love of Dickens' writing may have given him an eye for the eccentricity he found in the Australian bush and also have prompted him to embark ttpon the series of read- ings in his later years in emulation of his literary Idol. And this is where Mar- cus Cooney shows us Henry Lawson: baring himself in the latter Years of his life in the RSL hall of some Aus- tralian country town. 1111111111.11111111111111111 Alexander Hay has come to Perth to present this one-man show which is eminently suited to the intimacy of the Hole 'In The Wall Theatre, and ho obviously has not only sympathy but also em- pathy for Lawson. His presentation of the man has great warmth and humor and is backed by his marvellous stage presence and magnificent voice. I doubt if Henry Law- son would have come over as well in person, but Hay certainly makes him live again in this original piece of theatre which not only shows us the man in his anguish but reminds us of his great talent. Or; ) HENRY LAWSON ROGER Kemp . . . no resting on hi,. :ourel' Picture: Ernie Mclintock dear," says the artist, `` ''I've lost my exhibition. On opening night everyone was running around like rabbits in this maze looking for the silly thing ..." Alice and the white rabbit chase a few more escalators, run past the Nolans and Blackmails, follow atten- dants' pointed fingers - and arrive at the National Gallery of Victoria's Roger Kemp exhibition. "Phew," says Roger Kemp, peering at the works on the wall, as the white rabbit had peered at his watch, "we're here. But it'll probably take me a few minutes to get myself Into gear." At 70 and one of Australia's great- est abstract artists, Roger Kemp says that age doesn't :ratter a bit. "It's getting on with the job of doing things that matters," But giving interviews "and being made a fuss of" Is very wearing on a person, he says. The "fuss" is being made because he is probably Austra- lia's first artist to have five gallery exhibitions on show simultaneously. They are to celebrate his 70th birthday, give the public a retrospec- tive exhibition of 50 years' work and to launch a national tour of Kemp art, which Is expected to travel Aus- tralia for the next 18 months at least.. This tribute to the great artist, who was not given true national recognition until he was 60, has been organised by the head of Victoria's Monash University, Professor Patrick McCaughey, an art critic, historian and writer. One ,hundred Kemp paintings, stained glass-like Works, thickly painted geometries, in edominantly In white, blue and red acrylic, are being seen this month by crowds at Uncrossed lines mommor...mm MELBOURNE is bursting out all over with Roger Kemp 70th birthday exhibitions. Fiona Whitlock interviews the artist and Graeme Sturgeon re- views his work (below). various galleries in Melbourne. On September 30, the paintings will travel to the Benalla Art Gal- lery, Northern Victoria and from there, throughout Australia. Winner of nine awards, among them the 1968 Blake Prize for Religious Art and an OBE in 1970, Roger Kemp shuffles his desert boots on the National Gallery floor and makes three starts at explaining what the Kemp celebration means to him. "I think it's a great tribute, Urn, sort of . . . urn, I don't really know what I can talk about. It Involves me, um . . . yes, you could say It's a great thrill, all right?" Later, a little more relaxed, he says. "I am naturally very moved and very honored by all this." He is not, he says, "good at all this per- sonal aspect thing." But when a Kemp enthusiast comes up to him in the gallery, he opens up delightfully and talks to orth the SINCE no single gallery is capable of exhibiting all of the Roger Kemp paintings, five large groups of work from the various periods of the artist's life are being shown at different Melbourne locations. To see them all demands at least a full day's effort - and a round trip of 15km: In Kemp's case worth every mete. But even such a generous allow- ance of space as this - or even twice as much - Is inadequate to give a comprehensive overview of the vast qualities of work which for the past 56 sears have continued ,ti pour from Kemp's fertile Imagination and busy hand. In selecting the work for display, Professor Patrick McCaughey, In close co-operation with the artist, has chosen 91 paintings which are divided Into four groups, Early Work c.193- 1945 (Monash University Gal- lery), Metaphysical Paintings c.1945-1955 (College of the Arts Gal- lery), Maturity 1955-1975 (Mel- bourne University Gallery), and Paintings On l'aper: sequences 1968-1975 (National Gallery of Vic- toria). At Realities Gallery, Toorak, further 75 works are being exhibited which, although not part of Mc- Caughey's selection, are of interest because they include a group of eight her about his art. "Yes, my paint- ings constantly move. When I look at one of them. It will change all the time. "I experience something when I paint and it's there, even when the experience has gone. Rather like going on a holiday, coming back and reflecting It." He's not keen on Deing quoted. "I read this piece which said Roger Kemp was walking around in baggy trousers. I looked down at my trousers and thought, 'they're not baggy!' you're not writing that, too. are you?" He'd really rather people didn't ask him about his painting, too, but Prefers it to come from a personal appreciation. But patiently he gives an outline on What was going on in his head as he painted: "I am following out a big Idea which Is motivated by a big order of things, a cosmic sort of thing. All the crosses In my paintings are at- tually like figures, lik, choreography starting to no the music. They break, tin together." Growing a little more ke, idea, he continues: "It's phonic order, where no one move without moving ano:l Instance, if you take the el and blue moving together, come purple." The crosses in his paint ways a big point with a aren't crosses at all, lie stat'l "It's a principle. It's the the creative sort of moot atom revolving around a es force, which explodes and ,. gether again." Despite 50 years' paintini every day, Kemp says ill r be no resting on his laurel: I miss the beat or the r1t have to start all over age continuous evolvement, my a big structural movement The paintings ero not ha other than labels like Colley. Artist, 1988-1975, because t part of one form, he sa Picasso and the cubists, mu part and parcel of one big to Asked if he took up paint as "therapy after an till laughs. "Gawd, that's a re me. All I know is that painting." The deputy director of th al Gallery, Kenneth Hood. and asks: "How are yon Roger?" "I'm not really," says, moving around age had to talk on the ABC ft t a half hours this morning and I've been talking all dal I take the hint and leave, Roger Kemp is seen soft' around in his desert boot looking at his paintings. Curiouser and curIOUser foot -slogging paintings recently purchased for the Australian National Gallery, Can- berra. The earliest works, dated only ap- proximately since Kemp can no longer remember the exact sequence, are small in scale and deal with the familiar subjects of still-life, figure groups, portraits and landscape. Indeed, it Is unlikely that Kemp has ever been aware of such matters. Already they show the elements which have continued to Inform Kemp's work, the shallow space In which the action takes place, the fragmented all-over treatment, the compulsive repetition of shapes, the restricted color range, the dominance of the urge to create a powerful ar- chitectonic unity and the modifica- tion of natural appearance to achieve that end. Above all, they are Imbued with great vitality and (despite the awk- wardness of technique), a sense of purpose, of knowing not only precisely what the goal of his art would be, but in what direction he should move to reach it. It is also here that we can detect the influence of the work of external events, in thin case World War II. In Figures And Bridge, for example. the dark tones and sombre colors suffused by a fitful uneven light coupled with the mechanical, dehu- manised figures, make the atmo- sphere of the work sinister and doom -laden. All In sharp contrast to the fresh color and delicate tonality In the paintings of the post-war decade (College of the Arts) Kettles treatment became Increasingly frag- mented, dense to the point of clans- trophobia, And repetitious to the point of obsession. Ills increasing mastery and confi- dence led to larger paintings which take the human form as jumpinooff point, but so distort and disguise it that It seems to be merely a plastic device of no particular significance. This Is, however, not so, for Hemp the human figure Is central to his art and even In his most seemingly nun -representational work some vistigiclar trace of it's human deriva- tion remains. His works are not merely decora- tive, carefully structured abstrac- tions, but graphic revelations or an overriding philosophy, a snabolle language designed to catch and present what Kemp describes as his "experience and knowledge of hu- manity" and, further, to reveal in painterly terms the rhythms and structures which dominate not only nature but the universe. The thim segment (Melbourne University Gallery) is labelled matu- rity and covers the years from 1955 in 1975. By now the Paintings tend to be much larger In size and com- bine great technical freedom with complete assurance in the placement of forms and the spatial movement intsiated by anal and chromatic changes. Kemp has ans., powerful sense of the structure, even when he ell erately to ignore it, using and control the dynant which give his work its Ina tality. At the same time this y filet tended to explode ta the work. To harness ns lively these powerful fort began introducing a rnueo mat and obvious grit; which because it was "felt" rather than calculao the great swings and a; verticals and horizontals ii fective play, and yet hara rich variety to a cairn asst l It Is this group of w shows the height and Kemp's achievement, clef stealing that he was nr, In full control. The fourth part of selection, Paintings sequences 1968-75, deals n tinuing series of large a combine a grand freedon with delicate washes While this section t. on of considerable beauty, less Impact than the win other locations. This because of the cramped. the display, the poor ii the ItppresIve architect confine, and tilmlnishe should enhance. Next time you come to Sydney, treat yourself to