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Antipodeans
The Antipodeans (from the Greek: ἀντίποδες meaning literally “those at the antipodes”) were a group of Australian modern artists who asserted the importance of figurative art, and protested against abstract expressionism. Though they staged but a single exhibition in Melbourne during August 1959, they were noted internationally. History The Antipodeans group consisted of seven modern Melbourne painters and the art historian Bernard Smith, who compiled ''The Antipodean Manifesto'' in 1959, a declaration fashioned from the artists' comments as a catalogue essay to accompany their exhibit. Albert Tucker, not associated with the group, had begun exhibiting a series in a similar figurative style titled ''Antipodean Head'' in Europe in 1957. Member John Perceval exhibited a ceramic sculpture ''Antipodean Angel,'' a laughing figure standing on its hands, at Terry Clune Gallery in Sydney in May 1959. The artists were Charles Blackman, Arthur Boyd, David Boyd, John B ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Blackman
Charles Raymond Blackman (12 August 1928 – 20 August 2018) was an Australian painter, noted for the ''Schoolgirl, Avonsleigh'' and ''Alice in Wonderland'' series of the 1950s. He was a member of the Antipodeans, a group of Melbourne painters that also included Arthur Boyd, David Boyd, John Brack, Robert Dickerson, John Perceval, and Clifton Pugh. He was married for 27 years to author, essayist, poet, librettist and patron of the arts Barbara Blackman. Early life and initial success Blackman, born 12 August 1928 in Sydney, left school at 13 and worked as an illustrator with '' The Sun'' newspaper while attending night classes at East Sydney Technical College (1943–46) though was principally self-taught. He was later awarded an honorary doctorate. He came to notice following his move to Melbourne in the mid-1940s, where he became friends with Joy Hester, John Perceval and Laurence Hope as well as gaining the support of critic and art patron John Reed. His work met criti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arthur Boyd
Arthur Merric Bloomfield Boyd (24 July 1920 – 24 April 1999) was a leading Australian painter of the middle to late 20th century. Boyd's work ranges from impressionist renderings of Australian landscape to starkly expressionist figuration, and many canvases feature both. Several famous works set Biblical stories against the Australian landscape, such as ''The Expulsion'' (1947–48), now at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Having a strong social conscience, Boyd's work deals with humanitarian issues and universal themes of love, loss and shame. Boyd was a member of the Antipodeans, a group of Melbourne painters that also included Clifton Pugh, David Boyd, John Brack, Robert Dickerson, John Perceval and Charles Blackman. The Boyd Family line of successive and connective artists includes painters, sculptors, architects and other arts professionals, commencing with Boyd's grandmother Emma Minnie Boyd and her husband Arthur Merric Boyd, Boyd's father Merric and mother D ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Brack
John Brack (10 May 1920 – 11 February 1999) was an Australian painter, and a member of the Antipodeans group. According to one critic, Brack's early works captured the idiosyncrasies of their time "more powerfully and succinctly than any Australian artist before or since. Brack forged the iconography of a decade on canvas as sharply as Barry Humphries did on stage." Life During World War 2 (1940-1946) VX107527 Lieutenant John Brack served with the Field Artillery. Brack was Art Master at Melbourne Grammar School (1952–1962). His art first achieved prominence in the 1950s. He also joined the Antipodeans Group in the 1950s which protested against abstract expressionism. He was appointed Head of National Gallery of Victoria Art School (1962–1968), where he was an influence on many artists and the creation of the expanded school attached to the new gallery building. Style Brack's early conventional style evolved into one of simplified, almost stark, shapes and areas of delib ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clifton Pugh
Clifton Ernest Pugh AO, (17 December 1924 – 14 October 1990) was an Australian artist and three-time winner of Australia's Archibald Prize. One of Australia's most renowned and successful painters, Pugh was strongly influenced by German Expressionism, and was known for his landscapes and portraiture. Important early group exhibitions include The Antipodeans, the exhibition for which Bernard Smith drafted a manifesto in support of Australian figurative painting, an exhibition in which Arthur Boyd, David Boyd, John Brack, Robert Dickerson, John Perceval and Charles Blackman showed; a joint exhibition with Barry Humphries, in which the two responded to Dadaism; and Group of Four at the Victorian Artists Society Gallery with Pugh, John Howley, Don Laycock and Lawrence Daws. Pugh was made an Officer of the Order of Australia in 1985 for service to Australian Art. In 1990 he was appointed as the Australian War Memorial's official artist at the 75th anniversary celebration ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Robert Dickerson
Robert Henry Dickerson (30 March 1924 – 18 October 2015) was an Australian figurative painter and former member of the Antipodeans group of artists. Dickerson is one of Australia's most recognised figurative artists and one of a generation of influential artists who include Ray Crooke, Charles Blackman, Laurence Hope, Margaret Olley and Inge King. Professional artist Dickerson was a self-taught artist who refused to go to art school. His art has been described as angular and high contrast chiaroscuro and executed in a range of materials including paint, pastels, charcoals and other graphic media. The inspiration for his art came from everyday life and he drew on the themes of loneliness, vulnerability and isolation. Lone characters with long noses and whimsical, often averted eyes featured heavily of his work. He said it is "the same style I've always used", and did not intend to change it. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Perceval
John de Burgh Perceval AO (1 February 1923 – 15 October 2000) was a well-known Australian artist. Perceval was the last surviving member of a group known as the Angry Penguins who redefined Australian art in the 1940s. Other members included John Reed, Joy Hester, Sidney Nolan, Arthur Boyd and Albert Tucker. He was also an Antipodean and contributed to the Antipodeans exhibition of 1959. Biography Perceval was born Linwood Robert Steven South on 1 February 1923 at Bruce Rock, Western Australia, the second child of Robert South (a wheat farmer) and Dorothy (''née'' Dolton). His parents separated in 1925 and he remained at his father's farm until reunited with his mother and travelling to Melbourne in 1935. Following the marriage of his mother to William de Burgh Perceval, he changed his name to John and adopted the surname de Burgh Perceval. In 1938 Perceval contracted polio and was hospitalised, giving him the opportunity to further his skills at drawing and painting. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
David Boyd (artist)
David Fielding Gough Boyd (23 August 192410 November 2011) was an Australian artist, and a member of the Boyd artistic dynasty. Boyd family artistic dynasty The Boyd artistic dynasty began with the marriage of Emma Minnie à Beckett (known as Minnie) and Arthur Merric Boyd in 1886. Both were already established as painters at the time of their marriage. Their second-born son Merric Boyd married Doris Gough and had five artistic children, Lucy de Guzman Boyd, Arthur Boyd, Guy Boyd, David Boyd, and Mary Elizabeth Boyd. In 1948 David Boyd married Hermia Lloyd-Jones, the daughter of graphic artist Herman and Erica Lloyd-Jones. Following the tradition of their family, their three daughters Amanda, Lucinda, and Cassandra are artists. Education and career Boyd entered the Melba Memorial Conservatorium of Music in Melbourne at seventeen, but was conscripted to the army after one year. Upon his return, he studied art at the National Gallery School on an ex-serviceman's grant. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antipodes
In geography, the antipode () of any spot on Earth is the point on Earth's surface diametrically opposite to it. A pair of points ''antipodal'' () to each other are situated such that a straight line connecting the two would pass through Earth's center. Antipodal points are as far away from each other as possible. The North and South Poles are antipodes of each other. In the Northern Hemisphere, "the Antipodes" may refer to Australia and New Zealand, and Antipodeans to their inhabitants. Geographically, the antipodes of Britain and Ireland are in the Pacific Ocean, south of New Zealand. This gave rise to the name of the Antipodes Islands of New Zealand, which are close to the antipode of London. With the exception of a part of the Perth metropolitan area near Baldivis and Rockingham that is antipodal to Bermuda, the antipodes of Australia are in the North Atlantic Ocean, while parts of Spain, Portugal, France and Morocco are antipodal to New Zealand. Approximately 15% of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
George Johnson (artist)
George Henry Johnson (18 August 1926 – 26 December 2021) was a New Zealand artist who made his name in Australia. Artistic career Early career Johnson studied art under the emigre artist Theo Schoon, who confirmed an early commitment to modernist art, especially Geometric Abstraction. He graduated from Wellington Technical College in 1947. Johnson took influence from Dutch De Stijl, otherwise known as Neoplasticism. This Dutch art movement was based around architecturally structured pieces, similar to how you may view many of Johnson's works. Growing up, this artistic influence was significant as it was at the height of its popularity during Johnson's most impressionable years. Move to Australia Johnson relocated to Melbourne, Australia, in 1951 where he was soon drawn into contemporary art circles, mixing with Leonard French, Roger Kemp, Inge King, Julius Kane, Peter Graham, Clement Meadmore and others. He held his first solo exhibition there at the age of 30 in 1956 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roger Kemp
Francis Roderick Kemp AO, OBE, (Eaglehawk, 3 July 1908 - Melbourne 14 September 1987), known as Roger, was one of Australia's foremost practitioners of transcendental abstraction. Kemp developed a system of symbols and motifs which were deployed to develop a method of manifesting creativity at a fundamental level, striving in particular to explain humanities place in a universal order. Youth Francis Roderick Kemp was born on 3 July 1908, in California Gully, Eaglehawk. His father, Frank Kemp, worked at a gold mine, and his mother, Rebecca Kemp, raised the family. Both the Kemps and Harveys were devout Methodists and proud Cornish people. In 1913 the family moved to Melbourne after a mining accident. In late February 1920 Roger's father was struck by a tram and was pronounced dead on arrival when Roger was 12 years old.Christopher Heathcote, The Quest for Enlightenment: The Art of Roger Kemp, 2007 Work At twenty-one Kemp took his first formal steps to becoming an artist by ta ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heide Circle
The Heide Circle was a loose grouping of Australian artists who lived and worked at "Heide", a former dairy farm on the Yarra River floodplain at Bulleen, a suburb of Melbourne, counting amongst their number many of Australia's best-known modernist painters. History Heide was purchased in 1934 by John and Sunday Reed, passionate supporters and collectors of Australian art and culture. Amongst other activities, John Reed published the modernist literary magazine ''Angry Penguins'', which earned its place in Australia's cultural history with the notorious Ern Malley hoax in 1943. John Reed was a Tasmanian-born solicitor, graduate of Cambridge University in 1924. whose association with art and design begun in Melbourne in the mid 1920s, when he shared a home with illustrator and furniture designer Fred Ward. Around him were a circle of highly innovative and creative young and wealthy Melburnians including his sister Cynthia Reed Nolan, psychiatrist Reg Ellery, musicians Mansell Ki ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fred Williams (artist)
Frederick Ronald Williams OBE (23 January 192722 April 1982) was an Australian painter and printmaker. He was one of Australia’s most important artists, and one of the twentieth century's major landscapists. He had more than seventy solo exhibitions during his career in Australian galleries, as well as the exhibition ''Fred Williams - Landscapes of a Continent'' at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1977. Early life and education Fred Williams was born on 23 January 1927 in Richmond, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, the son of an electrical engineer and a Richmond housewife. Williams left school at 14 and was apprenticed to a firm of Melbourne shopfitters and box makers. From 1943 to 1947 he studied at the National Gallery School, Melbourne, at first part-time and then full-time from 1945 at the age of 18. The Gallery School was traditional and academic, with a long and prestigious history. He also began lessons under George Bell the following year, who h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
