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The Australian Art Sales Digest comment on the Connoisseurs Collection
After the icing on the quake - a small but tasteful serve from Watson's By our own correspondent, on 04-Aug-2011 A New Zealand auction house is expecting a solid turnout for its next sale despite the very modest size of its offering. The auction comprises just 25 lots. The sale is in Christchurch next Thursday ( August 11) and is Watson's first designated full-on art auction since the earthquake on February 22. Among the vendors are a prominent Cantabrian family, who are offering a Frances Hodgkins watercolour which will be the most valuable lot in the sale at an estimated $NZ75,000 to $NZ100,000 The size has been dictated not so much by the shortage of fresh stock that is endemic both sides of the Tasman but by careful editing, the auctioneers insist. Much of it was admittedly to have been auctioned in March but the auction was put off as the city began to recover. With an estimated value of $NZ330,000 to $NZ430,000 the sale has a special emphasis on the art of the South Island and Watson's hope it will be a bit of a moral booster after the events which include what New Zealanders in amazing good humour, callThe Icing on the Quake - the snow that followed. Read more0
Trevor Moffitt, Mackenzie With Dog Swimming in the Clutha River
When Southland born Trevor Moffitt decided in 1964 to produce a series of paintings depicting the famous sheep-stealer James Mackenzie, he started on a path that 40 years later would lead him to be regarded as one of New Zealand’s most significant narrative artists. Read more0
Trevor Moffitt, Big Fisherman
Trevor Moffitt’s ‘Big Fishermen’ paintings hail from the late 1960s and early 1970s, and they embrace an activity that was a big part of the artist’s recreational life. When Moffitt relocated from Southland to Timaru in 1962 he seized the opportunity to fish the Opihi and Rangitata. His later permanent base in Christchurch gave him access to the famous salmon waters of the Rakaia and it was there that he became acquainted with the many angling protocols surrounding the Canterbury river-mouth. These would have been a revelation to someone like Moffitt, whose primary angling experience came by way of the somewhat solitary nature of stalking trout on the rivers and lakes of Southland. Read more0
Frances Hodgkins
The date, setting and circumstances of this lively and delightfully informal work, are revealed by its close similarity to two other works which share precisely the same subject. They are The Convalescent, watercolour, 1912, (see Ascent 5: Frances Hodgkins Commemorative Issue, 1969, p. 31) andTwo Girls in Conversation, watercolour, c. 1912 (Frances Hodgkins 1869-1947, Whitford and Hughes, London, 1990, catalogue no. 3). All three watercolours depict the same two girls or young women in the same simply furnished room. Read more0
Rudi Gopas, Space
This painting was first exhibited as part of an exhibition entitled Galactic Landscapes 1965-67 at the New Vision Gallery as part of the Auckland Festival in May 1967, the only time Gopas ever had a one person show in Auckland. The painting was number five in a catalogue of twenty works and was given the title Unknown Regions. However on the back of the painting the title is given (twice) as Unknown Region; presumably the catalogue title is a misprint, possibly by analogy with three works in the catalogue given the title Uncharted Regions I, II, and III. There is also a second title on the back, namely Space, and the medium is given as oil, not PVA (polyvinal acetate). Presumably the work did not sell at the Auckland show and Gopas chose to exhibit it again under a different title. He may have felt that Space was better outside the context of the Galactic Landscapes exhibition. The different description of the medium is harder to explain. Perhaps before exhibiting it again Gopas reworked the surface of the painting with oil paints. Read more0
Doris Lusk, Queenstown
Queenstown, Watercolour Signed and Dated 1957
The vistas, scale and texture of the terrain around Queenstown captured Lusk’s attention over several decades and she returned to paint in this area throughout her career. The aerial perspective, strongly evident in the accomplished watercolour Queenstown, (1957), is typical of a number of Lusk landscapes and, in this regard, is reminiscent of her important Waikaremoana series, executed in the North Island the previous decade. The detailed foreground houses and trees hold the viewers attention in Queenstown as the scene opens up across Lake Wakatipu, past Frankton Arm, to the commanding drama of TheRemarkables, cropped at the top of the painting. The broad washes illustrate Lusk’s command of the watercolour medium and the forms and shapes within the painting are underpinned by strong observational drawing.
Auckland Art Gallery own the large related work, Frankton Arm, Lake Wakatipu - a highly-stylised oilexecuted in the same year. The watercolour Queenstown, was one of two works (the other an oil portrait) dated 1957 in Lusk’s 1973 Retrospective, held at the Dowse Art Gallery (now The New Dowse), Lower Hutt. The diversity of the exhibition, which included sixty-five still life, landscapes and several portraits, illustrated the depth of Lusk’s explorations and vision. The show was well received throughout the country and toured to Dunedin, Christchurch and Auckland. Perhaps most importantly it acknowledged Lusk’s contribution to painting in New Zealand at a significant time for the artist who by then was a highly respected lecturer at the University of Canterbury School of Fine Arts.
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Doris Lusk, Botanical Gardens
Botanical Gardens, Avon River (1945) was painted a few years after Lusk moved to Christchurch from Dunedin. During her studies at Dunedin’s King Edward Technical College (1934-9), Lusk was introduced to a modernist approach to landscape painting and encouraged to paint outdoors. She absorbed much from tutors Charlton Edgar and R. N. Field and from the mid-30s painted Central Otago subjects with a rare perception and vigour. In the early 1940s Lusk married Dermot Holland and moved to Christchurch. Botanical Gardens, Avon River, painted near the United Bowling, Tennis and Croquet Clubs building (depicted in the related oil Autumn, Avon River, 1944), appears almost naïve in execution, yet harvests a subtle strength. The subject of two small children playing in the river reflected Lusk’s situation at the time as a young mother with a toddler. The scale of the children, somewhat dwarfed by the large tree on the right of the composition, is held in check by the placement of the three blue-green benches and the sweep of both river and distant path. Lightly executed in oil on plywood, this charming painting is one of only four known oils of Hagley Park dating from the 1940s.
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Doris Lusk
Doris Lusk spent her formative years as an artist in the 1930s in Dunedin. The environment of that city with its harbour and hills predisposed her to being attracted to landscapes that had strong bold structure. On moving to Christchurch to live in 1942 she was equally attracted to the features of the Port Hills and geomophic of Banks Peninsula. From the late 1940s regular family holidays were spent near Akaroa and the landscapes that Lusk exhibited at Group exhibitions during that time and into the 1950s reflected those experiences. Back in Christchurch the Port Hills were a constant feature on the horizon and Lusk made many representational paintings looking down from these hills onto either the Canterbury Plains or Lyttelton Harbour. Read more0
William Henry Raworth
Mount Cook from Braemar, Watercolour, Signed, Titled and Dated 1872
During the early part of 1872 Raworth spent time in the Mount Cook region painting. Among the subjects that appears in several watercolours from this time is the Jollie River Valley and Gorge. This painting further back in the valley is thought to depict the early homestead at old Braemar Station looking up the Jollie River Valley toward Mt Cook. Raworth has painted the scene characteristically with a particularly dramatic nor’west sky. Like his teacher John Linnell the painting of skies was a good means of expressing the forces of nature and adding romantic atmosphere to a painting. At the time this watercolour was made Braemar Station had just passed out of the ownership of John Hall, later Sir John Hall, Prime-Minister of New Zealand 1879 -1882. Depicted dominantly in the painting is thought to be the original Braemar homestead which was once described as comprising just three rooms. Often, on such visits to the back country, Raworth would have someone local as a guide and occasionally he would include them in a painting. It is likely that the shepherd standing with his dog was Raworth’s guide on this occasion.
Born in Nottingham in 1821, Raworth became a pupil and later assistant to his uncle the celebrated London painter John Linnell (1792 -1882). Linnell was a strong advocate of naturalism which required painting as much as possible on the spot out of doors rather than in the studio. This is an approach that Raworth alsopracticed after he came to New Zealand but in contrast he did finish many watercolours in his studio. Raworth married his cousin Elizabeth Linnell (1824 -1880) in 1849 and they emigrated to Canterbury on the Sir George Seymour the following year. Within a short time of his arrival Raworth had set up a studio in Lyttelton and was advertising for pupils. However the 1850s did not offer many prospects for professional artists and within a few years Raworth had moved to Australia. However opportunities there were no greater for him and he returned to Canterbury. Around 1868 he set up his home and studio in Armagh St close to Hagley Park and began advertising for pupils. Over the next four years he also travelled extensively through the South Island and early in 1872 spent time painting in the Mt Cook region. By June of that year Raworth was back in Australia again where he held a major exhibition of some 100 watercolours of New Zealand Scenery atHines Gallery, Collins St, Melbourne. The reviews of the exhibition which included several Mt Cook paintings were full of praise, with Raworth’s works being ranked the equal to Nicholas Chevalier and John Gully for his mastery of the picturesque.
After nearly a year in Australia he returned to Christchurch but soon after moved south to Dunedin in search of better prospects. The few years Raworth spent in Otago offered him much material for his brush but limited remuneration and by 1878 he had moved once again to Australia, this time to Sydney. In 1884 and 1885 Raworth had two successful exhibitions respectively at Burlington Gallery and Conduit St Galleries London. Back in Sydney he continued to maintain his profile as an artist in Australia until his death in 1904 .