Emerging first in the 1960s, Robert Owen is one of Australia’s most eminent artists. His art traverses an ambitious and far-reaching range of mediums and contexts, from painting, sculpture, photography and installation, to public art and architectural commissions. Grounded in geometry and abstraction, his visually stunning works are inspired by his diverse interests—encompassing philosophy and psychology, science and mathematics, music and literature—and reflect his life-long curiosity about the world. Owen’s approach is underpinned by a poetic and intuitive exploration of the expressive potential of space, light, colour, context and materials.
The first museum survey of Owen’s practice for twenty years in Melbourne, this exhibition will encompass his work from the 1960s and 1970s living in Greece and London, while also featuring new and more recent paintings and sculptural installations.
PAT BRASSINGTON AT ARTBANK
Pat Brassington is featured in The Work of Art, currently showing at artbank.
Curated by Sabrina Baker and Anja Loughhead as part of the Artbank Emerging Curator program, the exhibition brings together a selection of works from the Artbank collection that interrogate our relationship to art and traditional notions of labour.
Join Sabrina and Anja alongside artist Darcey Bella Arnold at 1pm on Saturday 22 May as they discuss the physical, conceptual, material and emotional exertion tied to creative production and the importance of placing value on the - work of art.
More information >
TRACY SARROFF'S WORK AUGMENTED IN FLINDERS QUARTER
TRACY SARROFF is featured in the Flinders Quarter Augmented Art Walk, on now until 2 July.
Discover Tracy's artwork pasted up in the foyer of Journal Cafe and City Library, 253 Flinders Lane, Melbourne, then unlock each its animation and sound using your phone or tablet device via the augmented reality EyeJack app, free to download for iPhones and Android.
JANET LAURENCE ON DISPLAY AT MCCLELLAND GALLERY
The McClelland Collection: 50 Years of Spatial Practice is now open.
Featuring this stunning work by Janet Laurence , Forensic sublime (Crimes against the landscape series: Styx Forest), the exhibition explores the significant collection McClelland has developed in its 50-year history.
The exhibition continues to 15 August.
ROBERT OWEN INTERVIEWED ON ART GUIDE PODCAST
ROBERT OWEN is the subject of the fourth episode of Art Guide’s podcast series The Long Run, now streaming. In the episode, Robert talks with host Tiarney Miekus about what it means to create over six decades, and what he feels is the truth of his art: a sense of oneness.
Listen to the podcast here >
Robert Owen's survey show, Blue Over Time, is currently on display at Heide Museum of Modern Art, closing 23 May.
JANET LAURENCE REFERENCED IN NEW BOOK
Award-winning author and art historian Janine Burke has written a new book, My Forests: Travels with Trees. Published by Melbourne Uni Publishing, My Forests offers an enchanting and illuminating meander along forest trails within art, myth, history and present day.
Reflecting on JANET LAURENCE'S Forest (Theatre of Trees) recently exhibited at the MCA, Burke writes:
"I’m in a forest in a gallery. It’s a labyrinth made of drifting voile curtains in tones of mauve and silver, imprinted with towering images of trees. It reaches from ceiling to floor. Though in a public place, this forest makes me feel sequestered. It’s shadowy; tantalising. What’s around the bend? Revelation? A nasty surprise? I think of Little Red Riding Hood and the other fairytale children whose exploration of the forest symbolises maturity, courage and independence. The trek into the unconscious, the reward of self-knowledge, a process psychologist Bruno Bettelheim described as “the uses of enchantment”. As I follow the circular path, the tree-curtains move gently in my wake."
My Forests: Travels with Trees is available to purchase here.
PETER DAVERINGTON AT ART GALLERY OF BALLARAT
Peter Daverington, The Raft of the Clan, 2018, oil and acrylic on canvas, 260 x 397 cm.
PETER DAVERINGTON'S The Raft of the Clan is featured in Out of darkness: A survivor's journey, which opens today Art Gallery of Ballarat.
Out of the darkness: A survivor’s journey is an exhibition of works collected, commissioned and curated by Robert House, a survivor of child sexual abuse. The memories of House’s childhood experiences have continued to haunt him and affect his mental wellbeing, but he has employed determination and resilience to become an advocate for survivors, and work towards a more just society.
House has developed a passion for art, becoming convinced of its ability to represent the complexity of the trauma and other emotions experienced by survivors. He has commissioned, collected and created art, building a unique collection of works that reveal the journey of our society as it comes to terms with this shocking history. His collection reflects his personal journey, carrying the message that the voices of survivors should be heard and responded to with compassion and understanding.
“This was a difficult subject to portray,” says Daverington. “I settled on the idea of survival at sea as a metaphor for the survivors of child abuse - they were abused by a system entrusted with their care. I chose Gericault’s, ‘raft of the Medusa’ (in the louvre) as a source of inspiration… The young people in my painting are empowered, fighting for their rights and protesting injustice. This is a tribute to the people of the CLAN (Care Leavers Australia Network) , who after years of protest, have their voices finally heard. The portraits on the border are significant individuals involved with bringing the case to a royal commission. They include former prime ministers, politicians, royal commissioners and CLAN members.”
The exhibition continues to 1 August.
More information >
ROBERT OWEN BOOK TALK
This afternoon Heide will host a book talk with ROBERT OWEN, his studio manager and book editor Angela Connor, and book designers Stuart Geddes and Paul Mylecharane. The panel will discuss the journey of producing Robert Owen – A Book of Encounters, the first major monograph of one of Australia’s most eminent artists. The talk will be facilitated by Dan Rule, director of Perimeter Books.
Tickets to this event include museum entry and a glass of wine. It’s set to be a rainy afternoon: great museum weather! Reserve your spot at the book talk now and enjoy an afternoon at Heide with a tipple afterwards!
Book here >
Robert Owen with his monograph, photographed by Jake Roden.
ROBERT OWEN INTRODUCES 'WORDS OF LOVE' FILM
Tomorrow Saturday 24 April at 3pm, Heide x Cinema Nova will be presenting Marianne & Leonard, Words of Love to celebrate the exhibition Robert Owen: Blue Over Time – A Survey, with an introduction by the artist. Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love is a documentary film about the relationship between Marianne and Leonard, and their time spent on the Greek island of Hydra in the 1960s and 1970s.
In 1963, Robert Owen set off on a Greek boat for London. Along the way, he stopped off on Hydra intending to only stay a night. Unbeknownst to him, Hydra was a haven for bohemian expatriates, including George Johnston, Charmian Clift, William Lederer, Jack Hirschman and Leonard Cohen.
For three years (1963 – 66) Robert lived and worked on the island, making musical instruments and artworks, writing poetry and selling jewellery to tourists in the summer. It was also on Hydra that two events occurred that would change the course of Robert’s arts practice: an eclipse of the sun over the Peloponnese and the discovery of a Maggi soup cube wrapper.
More information >
Catherine Woo, Current I-IV, 2021, acrylic on aluminium, 183 x 503 cm (overall)
CATHERINE WOO OPENS 'VIBRANT MATTER' AT ARC ONE
A master of the surface and abstraction, Catherine Woo’s striking new body of work is an instinctive and powerful examination of the human connection with the natural world.
Catherine Woo is known for her visually arresting oeuvre of ‘painting with weather’. By using a range of unconventional materials and processes, Woo creates works that are both macro and micro-interpretations of natural phenomena. Her delicate, abstract forms, rendered in intensely detailed surfaces, draw forth various analogies between the body and the environment. In this recent body of work, Woo continues this investigation into the interrelationship between humans and the natural world via layered, undulating and ethereal paintings that examine the complex systems and structures of nature.
In previous works Woo found herself a silent partner to the visualisation of natural forces – vibration, evaporation, reticulation. In this chapter, she is now compelled to make the human element more present by incorporating intimate, hand-painted forms.
Intricate compositions weave together evoking water currents; leaf veins; coral skeletons; pulsing arteries; webs; microscopic snapshots from within the body and formations of earth. In conflating the regions
of the body and the environment, new possibilities are explored where the self is inextricable from the environment that contains it. Drawing the exhibition title from a text by philosopher Jane Bennett, Woo suggests that by seeing ourselves as part of a network of Vibrant Matter, we can begin to think more ecologically:
“Rather than seeing the environment as something ‘outside’, beyond our bodies, these patterns and processes suggest being within it – where our own bodies are part of a larger body, intimately and inextricably linked. It is a kind of visual acknowledgment of our participation in a vast changing body of living matter.” - Catherine Woo, 2021
As Jane Bennett asserts in the text “such a new found attentiveness to matter and its powers will not
solve the problem of human exploitation or oppression, but it can inspire a greater sense of the extent to which all bodies are kin in the sense of inextricably enmeshed in a dense network of relations. And in the knotted world of vibrant matter, to harm one section of the web may very well be to harm oneself. Such an enlightened and expanded notion of self-interest is good for humans.” 1
Visually stunning, these extraordinary paintings simultaneously speak to themes of nature, beauty, the body, and geography, while resisting representation in the pursuit of more philosophical concerns.
Catherine Woo graduated with a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Tasmania in 2013, having also studied at Sydney College of Fine Arts and the ANU School of Art. She has exhibited her work across Australia and internationally since 1997. In 2008 and 2011, Woo was awarded a $20,000 New Work grant by the Australia Council Visual Art Board, and was included in the Biennial of Australian Art, Art Gallery of South Australia (2008). In 2010, Woo was curated into an exhibition at the Samstag Museum in Adelaide titled Abstract Nature. She has been a Finalist in the City of Hobart Art Prize in 2002, 2011 and 2012. Her major corporate commissions include: Visy Corp Australia, the Chinese World Trade Centre, Beijing, Shangri-
la Hotel, Beijing; Four Seasons, Hong Kong; and the Ritz Carlton Hotel, Shanghai and Perth. Her work is represented in private and public collections in Australia, including Artbank, Macquarie Bank, and RACV, as well as in the UK and Asia.
1 Jane Bennett, Vibrant Matter: A Political Ecology of Things (Duke University Press, 2010), 13.
CYRUS TANG SHORTLISTED FOR SOVEREIGN ART PRIZE
Cyrus Tang, Remember me when the sun goes down: Power Cables, 2020, archival pigment print, 90 x 90 cm.
Congratulations Cyrus Tang! Her work Remember me when the sun goes down: Power Cables is shortlisted for the Sovereign Art Prize.
The Sovereign Asian Art Prize was launched in 2003 to increase the international exposure of artists in the region, whilst raising funds for programmes that support disadvantaged children using expressive arts. Held annually, The Prize is now recognised as the most established and prestigious annual art award in Asia-Pacific.
In the wake of the past year, Tang wishes to memorialise images that address our collective experiences, anxieties, and hopes, allowing us space to remember and recover. Having had a renewed opportunity to explore her landscape, Tang created 'Remembering me when the sun goes down - Power Cables'. The artist, drawn to the geometrical composition of the sky, took daily photos of the power cables. She then collated the images, creating composite, ethereal layers. At the centre point of convergence, the image condenses and vibrates, as if to confirm a moment of real existence.
The finalists’ artworks will be presented to the public at 9 Queen’s Road Central, Central, Hong Kong from 5 – 16 May 2021. The artworks will then be exhibited at Art Central at Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre from 20 – 23 May 2021.
More information >
LYNDELL BROWN & CHARLES GREEN AT CAM
LYDNELL BROWN & CHARLES GREEN have work showing at the Castlemaine Art Museum in their new exhibition Cloudy - a few isolated showers.
In this exhibition, clouds gather in the Whitchell Gallery with historical and contemporary painting, photography, sound, watercolour and sculpture, curated by Jenny Long.
Castlemaine-locals Charles and Lyndell present three new works made during 2020, over a period of uncertainty, crisis and the suspension of sociability and travel. The paintings depict Castlemaine clouds, the winds of change, and the wider world and its turbulence.
Cloudy - a few isolated showers continues at CAM until the end of the year.
Left to right: Lyndell Brown & Charles Green, Activism is Learning, 2020, oil on linen; Lyndell Brown & Charles Green, Orpheus, 2020, oil on linen; Lyndell Brown & Charles Green, Into the White Light, 2020, oil on linen.
JANET LAURENCE AT S.H. ERVIN GALLERY
Janet Laurence. ‘Tree of Knowledge’, 2021, mixed media installation
JANET LAURENCE is featured in the new show at S.H. Ervin Gallery, ‘TREE of LIFE: a testament to endurance’.
Opening today, this group exhibition led by First Nations artists will generate a fresh, positive energy towards the reclamation of diminishing natural resources. Threads woven through 'Tree of Life' will recognise the deep spiritual and physical associations that connect all forms of life – life that must be nurtured as we chart a course of action through this perilous age of climate change, pandemics and wildfires.
The exhibition will continue until 30 May.
MURRAY FREDERICKS IN THE WEEKEND AUSTRALIAN
MURRAY FREDERICKS is featured in The Weekend Australian Magazine this week.
Speaking about Array 1, the final work in his award-winning, 16-year SALT Project, Murray says: "The shore disappears, the sky and water merge... there's nothing around, so you lose all reference points. And your mind just dissolves into the space."
"It felt like the crescendo at the end of a piece of classical music. After 16 years on this project I thought, that's the one to go out on."
Murray Fredericks has been drawn to Kati Thanda (Lake Eyre), South Australia, over the course of 16 years, creating dazzling abstract images that bear witness to the transcendent capacity of the natural world.
Murray Fredericks, Array 1, 2019, digital pigment print on cotton rag, 120 x 300 cm
BROWN & GREEN AWARDED 3 YEAR RESEARCH GRANT
Lyndell Brown and Charles Green have been awarded a 3-year Australian Research Council grant to collaborate with artist Jon Cattapan, Indigenous activist, film-maker, musician and playwright Richard Frankland, and eminent biomedicine researcher Gary Anderson.
“THE WAR AT HOME: ART DESCRIBES AUSTRALIA'S TURBULENT PRESENT”
This project investigates the friction between the nation’s stories of itself, and the current massive fracturing of health, of places and of peoples. Because Australia is changing beyond measure, it is appropriate to talk about the war at home. From World War 1 onwards, the Australian government decided that war artists be commissioned to make art about the nation at war. This project proposes that a team of Australian artists, with a deep experience of picturing conflict, investigates the current war at home, guided by a senior Gunditjimara elder and in collaboration with an eminent biomedical scientist.
ROBERT OWEN INTERVIEWED IN SPECTRUM
ROBERT OWEN is interviewed in The Age’s Spectrum today!
Ray Edgar speaks to Robert about some of his career highlights, including heading the sculpture department at RMIT, representing Australia at the Venice Biennale, and his recognisable architectural commissions such as the Webb Bridge at Docklands and the Craigieburn Bypass over the Hume. The two also discuss Robert's time as a ‘boho expat’ on the Greek island of Hydra in the 60s, his mentorship by Leonard Cohen and his study of Buddhism, alchemy and theoretical physics.
Edgar writes: “Witnessing a natural phenomenon in Hydra had a...profound impact: an eclipse of the sun creating a spectacular spectrum. Beguiled from that moment, Owen sought to recreate its numinous light. “I wanted the spectrum,” Owen declares. “that’s the colour I wanted to see. I was interested in this inner self, that’s the soul inside, that’s full of light”.
Edgar also looks into the breadth of the 70 works now showing in Owen’s retrospective at HEIDE and speaks to curator Sue Cramer.
ANNE ZAHALKA AT CHINA CULTURAL CENTRE
Anne Zahalka, Flocking Flamingos, 2018, pigment ink on canvas, 100x 150cm
ANNE ZAHALKA is featured in the new exhibition at the China Cultural Centre in Sydney. ‘AIR WATER LOVE’ is now open at CCC and will continue until 29 April.
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This is the second exhibition at CCC privileging a cross-cultural women’s perspective after the successful ‘WHOSE STORY IS THIS?…anyway!’ in 2020. In this exhibition eight women artists from China and Australia have a dialogue under the same theme, calling for a rethink of crucial environmental issues. Three keywords of water, air and love were selected to present the relationship between humanity and nature.
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‘AIR WATER LOVE’ highlights the true effects of global warming and climate change – showing the impacts, offering solutions, and telling real-life accounts, this exhibition is interactive and creative.
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More information >
DANI MARTI NEW WORKS IN DUSSELDORF
DANI MARTI is currently showing in in the exhibition FARBMATERIAL at the Galerie Lausberg in Dusseldorf.
This body of work, ‘Songs of Surrender’, was made in Barcelona in 2019, where Dani had these beautifully designed ropes custom-made. He uses the lines of rope to create pictorial and sculptural surfaces strung over powder coated aluminium frames, bringing the works into an “object dimension”.
FARBMATERIAL (Colour Material) will continue until 21 March.
You can watch Dani introduce the work here.
Jacky Redgate, Light Throw (Mirrors) #4, 2011, silver halide Chromogenic photograph handprinted, 126 x 158 cm
PAT BRASSINGTON & JACKY REDGATE IN BOWNESS ANNIVERSARY EXHIBITION
Pat Brassington, Shadow Boxer, pigment print, 72 x 50 cm
JACKY REDGATE & PAT BRASSINGTON have works on display at Smith & Singer on Collins Street for the next few weeks, as part of the MGA’s travelling exhibition Bowness Photography Prize Celebrates 15 Years.
In 2020 the Bowness Photography Prize marked its 15th year. To celebrate MGA has partnered with Smith & Singer to showcase the previous 15 recipients during the International Photo Festival. As the recipients of the 2011 and 2013 prizes respectively, Redgate and Brassington’s works are on view!
The Bowness Photography Prize has become an important survey of contemporary photographic practice and one of the most prestigious prizes in the country. The Prize reveals artists’ continued fascination with exploring and pushing the boundaries of the photographic medium, embracing its capacity to explore a diversity of voices and perspectives.
The exhibition will continue until 7 March.
ROBERT OWEN FEATURED IN ART COLLECTOR
Image: Art Collector Magazine issue 95.
ROBERT OWEN is featured in the latest issue of Art Collector Magazine.
Jacqueline Millner writes about the the artist's forthcoming survey exhibition at Heide Museum of Modern Art, 'Blue Over Time: Robert Owen - A Survey'.
'The Heide survey's title underlines the importance of the colour blue in Owen's practice, with its evocation of infinite space and the possibility of dimensions beyond those we currently know. In Owen's work, blue occupies that place between earthly and otherworldly realms, embodying the reverie and imagination that the artist hopes his art will also spark, along with the capacity to patch and heal what has been fractured. Owen inflects the materiality of colour, light and place through the beauty of mathematics, having some time ago observed that "geometry is a good way to find yourself through a crisis" (a sentiment all too pertinent today)', writes Millner.
'Blue Over Time: Robert Owen - A Survey, curated by Sue Cramer, shows at Heide Museum of Modern Art from 27 February to 23 May 2021.