Dr John Joseph Wardell Power (1881–1943) was an Australian

Modernist Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...

artist. He studied medicine at the

University of Sydney The University of Sydney (USYD), also known as Sydney University, or informally Sydney Uni, is a public research university located in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and is one of the country's si ...

and served as a doctor in the First World War. After the war he left medicine and studied at the Atelier Araújo in Paris and became interested in

Cubism Cubism is an early-20th-century avant-garde art movement that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassemble ...

and abstract art. He was a member of the London Group and the Comite Abstraction-Creation, Paris. JW Power died in Jersey, Channel Islands in 1943. He left his estate (worth £A2 million) to the University of Sydney where the

Power Institute of Fine Arts The Power Institute of Fine Arts is a teaching and research department, encompassing the fields of art history and theory, within the University of Sydney. Background Founded in 1968, the institute was established out of a bequest from the expatr ...

now bears his name. The Power bequest was the core funding to set up Sydney's Museum of Contemporary Art.

Works

Power authored the book Eléments de la Construction Picturale (Paris, 1932). In his treatise, he acknowledges a Brazilian painter, Pedro Correia de Araújo (who he calls Senhor Pedro Araujo) as the one who introduced him to the subject. The University of Sydney has over 1000 of his works, including 150 canvases. The National Library of Australia also holds a collection of artworks from his collection, personal papers and printed material.

References

External links

JW Power, Australian Dictionary of Biography
Sydney Morning Herald, 18 July 2014 1881 births 1943 deaths Cubist artists Australian painters Modern painters University of Sydney alumni Australian philanthropists 20th-century Australian painters 20th-century Australian male artists Australian expatriates in France 20th-century philanthropists Australian male painters {{Australia-painter-stub