Defective Models: Australian Portraiture 19th & 20th Centuries from Regional, University & Private Collections
Dates:
4 – 30 June 1990
Artists:
Rick Amor, Julian Ashton, Sam Atyeo, George Bell, Charles Blackman, Arthur Boyd, John Brack, Rupert Bunny, Marshall Claxton, Kevin Connor, Noel Counihan, Aleks Danko, Sir William Dargie, David Davies, Roy de Maistre, Sir William Dobell, George Dowling, Thomas Flintoff, William Frater, Donald Friend, Bernard Hall, Ponch Hawkes, Joy Hester, Adrian Lawlor, Percy Leason, Sir John Longstaff, Geoff Lowe, Fiona Macdonald, Sir Edgar Mackennal, Lewis Miller, John Molvig, John Nixon, John Olsen, Mike Parr, Jim Paterson, Clifton Pugh, Peter Purves Smith, James Quinn, Hugh Ramsay, Richard Read, Tom Roberts, Robert Rooney, Gareth Sansom, Andrew Sibley, Bess Tait, Terry Taylor, Violet Teague, Albert Tucker, Danila Vassilieff, Jenny Watson, Fred Williams, Tony Woods, Anne Zahalka
Curated by:
Jenepher Duncan
Opened by:
Professor Max Charlesworth (Philosophy, Deakin University)
Location:
Monash University Gallery
Monash University, Clayton Campus
About the exhibition
Featuring seventy paintings, drawings, etchings, photographs and sculptures, Defective Models traced responses to the portrait genre from 1830 through to 1990—a period during which traditional notions of portraiture, including self-portraiture, evolved significantly. Works drawn from the Monash University Collection were supplemented by key examples from contemporary artists who have made important contributions to the conceptual and formal development of portraiture in Australia.
The exhibition revealed both the susceptibility and resilience of the genre across the nineteenth and twentieth centuries: from extroverted and socially conscientious modes such as in Thomas Flintoff's Henry Stone & his Durham Bull, 1887, to the emotional and confessional authenticity of Mike Parr’s 1990 self-portrait series.
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