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October 30, 2005
I spend the morning in Brisbane looking over the Queensland Art Gallery, as it was just across the river from the Chifley Hotel where I was staying. I spent several hours there before I caught a taxi to the airport to catch a plane back to Adelaide.
The Gallery was much smaller than I'd remembered, and it's collection of Australian art on show was modest.
They had a number of works of Ian Fairweather ---i was suprise by how heavy and ponderous they were, and subdued the colour was. Fairweather painted in Queensland near Brisbane, in a climate that is bright, sunny, green and full of colour--the purples and reds were everywhere today. Where was his eye? What was it looking at?
Ian Fairweather, Kite Flying, 1958
What was noticeable was less the fragmentary forms and figurative elements and more the layers and layers of paint. A number of works were dark and foreboding.
The Australian art section finished in 1975. That's thirty years ago. But I understand that a new Gallery of Modern Art is being built.
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