Helen Maudsley (born 1927) is an Australian artist, who has been described as "one of Australia’s most tenacious and perhaps most underrated artists". Born in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

in 1927, Maudsley has had regular solo exhibitions since 1957. She is best known for her complex paintings and drawings that use abstraction and visual analogy to describe inner and outer worlds. Maudsley describes her paintings as “visual essays,” in that they are focused, methodical attempts to explore a concept. Through exploration of visual language, Maudsley uses lines, numbers, shapes, letters, geometry and symbols to construct geometric labyrinth-like compositions that explore her everyday experiences.

Life and education

Maudsley grew up in

South Yarra South Yarra is an inner-city suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 4 km south-east of Melbourne's Melbourne central business district, Central Business District, located within the Cities of City of Melbourne, Melbourne and City of Sto ...

. After studying at the

Melbourne Conservatorium of Music The Melbourne Conservatorium of Music is the music school at the University of Melbourne and part of the Faculty of Fine Arts and Music. It is located near the Melbourne City Centre on the Southbank campus of the University of Melbourne. Degree ...

, Maudsley attended the National Gallery of Victoria Art School in Melbourne from 1945–1947. During the 1960s, she gained a Graduate Diploma in Fine Art from the

Victorian College of the Arts The Victorian College of the Arts (VCA) is the arts school at the University of Melbourne in Australia. It is part of the university's Faculty of Fine Arts and Music. It is located near the Melbourne city centre on the Southbank campus of the ...

, Melbourne. While studying, Maudsley met (and later married) fellow Australian artist,

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 Aust ...

(1920–1999).

Artistic style

Maudsley has a distinct personal palette, often described as "subdued." Her work often contains figures, landscapes and buildings that emerge from initially ambiguous graphic constellations. Drawing on the history of Western art, Maudsley includes many symbolic references in her work. For example, the recurring reference to the musical tenor in Maudsley's work connects the non-verbal nature of music with painting. This may be due to her time spent studying at the

. Her paintings are said to reveal the nuanced personal perspective of how Maudsley experiences the world around her, with the objective of opening up viewer's own worldview. Maudsley is known for her work in oil on canvas, however prior to 1967 she worked predominantly in gouache, watercolour and ink. This was largely to do with space and time constraints, as she did not have a personal studio in her home while raising four young daughters. In her more recent work, each piece is developed over approximately eight drafts in

gouache Gouache (; ), body color, or opaque watercolor is a water-medium paint consisting of natural pigment, water, a binding agent (usually gum arabic or dextrin), and sometimes additional inert material. Gouache is designed to be opaque. Gouache ...

before the design is transferred to tracing paper, and finally completed with oil on canvas. Because of the abstract and symbolic nature of her work, Maudsley believes that the audience plays an active role in viewing and understanding her art. In a 2018 interview, she explains how she values her audiences putting in effort: "the energy that it takes to try and hear what somebody is saying, that's the virtue... it's not an intellectual thing; it's the act of trying to hear what's being said."

Exhibitions

Maudsley has had solo exhibitions regularly since 1957. Her work is held in a number of public collections, including the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docum ...

and the

National Gallery of Australia The National Gallery of Australia (NGA), formerly the Australian National Gallery, is the national art museum of Australia as well as one of the largest art museums in Australia, holding more than 166,000 works of art. Located in Canberra in th ...

, as well as several galleries around Australia including the Art Gallery of South Australia, the Art Gallery of New South Wales, and the

National Gallery of Victoria The National Gallery of Victoria, popularly known as the NGV, is an art museum in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Founded in 1861, it is Australia's oldest and most visited art museum. The NGV houses an encyclopedic art collection across two ...

. Her work is also held in numerous private collections.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Maudsley, Helen 1927 births 20th-century Australian women artists 20th-century Australian artists Living people 21st-century Australian women artists 21st-century Australian artists People from South Yarra, Victoria Artists from Melbourne National Gallery of Victoria Art School alumni Victorian College of the Arts alumni