Last week, The Australian reported that 49 artworks had been identified by the Art Gallery of South Australia (AGSA) with gaps in their ownership history that could signal they were stolen. Asian antiquities…
After ten years of planning and six years of construction the Harvard Art Museums opens its doors to the public on November 16. The $350 million renovation combines the collections of three distinct museums…
In 1919, Ivy MacKusick, an art student at UCL’s Slade School of Fine Art, completed a Portrait of a Man in His Shirtsleeves. We know nothing about the man of African descent depicted in this portrait…
On October 12, New York City’s Museum of Modern Art unveiled its exhibition of Henri Matisse’s cut-outs. This came on the heels an exhibition of the cut-outs at the Tate Modern in London, which displayed…
The Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported one of the great recent discoveries in the art world last week. It claimed that 90-year-old Mina Gregori, one of the doyennes of Italian art history, had found…
What’s the key to understanding art? Could there be some easy steps to unpacking the meaning of an artwork? The short answer is: yes. I recently wrote an article for The Conversation called Three questions…
Despite our interconnectedness through radio, television and the internet, the coverage of arts and cultural activities in Australia is viewed from a very close focus. This corrupts our understanding of…
At Royal Holloway College at the University of London, Edwin Landseer’s picture “Man Proposes, God Disposes” (1864) is covered by a Union Flag every year during exams. Not because of any fears of cheating…
Some computer scientists at Rutgers University in New Jersey have written a computer programme that finds connections between paintings and can even discover influences between artists, they claim. This…
Last September, I sat down in the Capital Theatre in Bendigo to listen to American composer Morton Feldman’s String Quartet No.2 played by the Flux Quartet from New York. Sounds a nice way to spend an…
Earlier this week, just three days before the 25th anniversary of Tiananmen Square democratic movement, Chinese-Australian artist Guo Jian was taken from his Beijing home by local police. He’s currently…
There is currently something of a Kenneth Clark renaissance, with an exhibition devoted to him just opened at Tate Britain, and a new Civilisation planned by the BBC. If there is anything to be gained…
Nationalism is not always a good thing where understanding art is concerned, but in the case of Italian Masterpieces from Spain’s Royal Court, Museo del Prado on show at the National Gallery of Victoria…
Rembrandt Duits, School of Advanced Study, University of London
A painting is often like theatre. There are actors, who give expression to a narrative. They are distributed across a stage floor and positioned against a scenic backdrop. The artist is both the stage…
The public response to a recent article in the Guardian on a campaign for more children to study art history at school left me thinking about what more we can do to shrug off stereotypical views of the…
Not for the first time Britain and Australia are at loggerheads over cultural heritage. At issue this time are two images of genuine historical significance to both countries: Kongouro from New Holland…
Max Dupain and Frank Hinder are among the many significant artists who contributed decisively to Australia’s modernist tradition. Less well known, however, is that they both worked for Australia’s military…
Death has a special significance in the history of art. Whenever artists die, a kind of art dies with them. Painting will survive Jeffrey Smart (1921–2013) but the kind of picture that he produced is impossible…
The contemporary art critic cannot say with certainty whether something is good or bad. What good criticism does today is to help the public “see” the artwork. It does not explain and close down meaning…
It was the 1960s when a curator – who shall remain nameless – was ordered to hang Aboriginal artist Albert Namatjira’s work in his gallery. He hung the painting next to the ladies toilet with a vase of…
Honorary (Senior Fellow) School of Culture and Communication University of Melbourne. Editor in Chief, Design and Art of Australia Online, The University of Melbourne