David Jones, artist and poet (1895-1974) begins his PREFACE TO THE ANATHEMATA :
'I have made a heap of all that I could find.' (1) So wrote Nennius, or whoever composed the introductory matter to Historia Brittonum. He speaks of an 'inward wound' which was caused by the fear that certain things dear to him 'should be like smoke dissipated'. Further, he says, 'not trusting my own learning, which is none at all, but partly from writings and monuments of the ancient inhabitants of Britain, partly from the annals of the Romans and the chronicles of the sacred fathers, Isidore, Hieronymous, Prosper, Eusebius and from the histories of the Scots and Saxons although our enemies . . . I have lispingly put together this . . . about past transactions, that [this material] might not be trodden under foot'. (2)
(1) The actual words are coacervavi omne quod inveni, and occur in Prologue 2 to the Historia.
(2) Quoted from the translation of Prologue 1. See The Works of Gildas and Nennius, J.A.Giles, London 1841.
She's changing her name
From Kitty to Karen
She's trading her MG for a white Chrysler LeBaron
I want a girl with a short skirt and a long jacket
- Cake, Short Skirt/Long Jacket
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William Robinson, Landscape 19, 1987
William Robinson, Sunset and Rising Moon, 1993
Theatre of the Actors of Regard
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Some fortunate someone acquired this Robert Rooney painting at the D&H auction in Melbourne last night.
Lot 111
ROBERT ROONEY
(1937 – 2017)
SCHOOL ARTS STORMS: BIG RED TREE, 2002
synthetic polymer paint on canvas
118.5 x 178.5 cm
signed, dated and inscribed with title verso:
ROBERT ROONEY / SCHOOL ARTS STORMS: BIG RED TREE / SEPTEMBER 2002 / …
Earlier in the day we further photographed the site of last week's storm upon on the local oak.
Theatre of the Arborists of Regard
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The local oak
at the end of winter
Too large for a single snap
now it's the end of spring
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On not being able to see
the forest
for the trees
the wood
for the word
the see
for thee, calligraphy
- after Issa
Theatre of the Actors of Regard
collection FIAPCE
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Picked from yesterday's Label Tree ...
FIAPCE
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Theatre of the Actors of Regard
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Once a tree
was felled and sawn
and set to gatepost border work
Today a letter from the Queen
congratulates our seventeen Centurian
Emeritus at Bonzaview
[A Day in the Life - The Beatles : Verse 1]
I read the news today, oh boy
About a lucky man who made the grade
And though the news was rather sad
Well I just had to laugh
I saw the photograph
He blew his mind out in a car
He didn't notice that the lights had changed
A crowd of people stood and stared
They'd seen his face before
But nobody was really sure if he was from the House of Lords
I saw a film today, oh, boy
The English Army had just won the war
A crowd of people turned away
But I just had to look
Having read the book
I'd love to turn you on
John Berger
dead at XC
vale
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The Tempest (Act 5, Scene 1)
by William Shakespeare
Ariel sings :
Where the bee sucks, there suck I:
In a cowslip’s bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat’s back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.
click image to enlarge
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Given the postings of recent days,
AUSTRALIA : new pavilion opens for 56th Venice Biennale
More Melbourne Black : Herald Outdoor Art Show
and having just received an auction notice for Noel Counihan's
Albert Namitjira (1959)
screenprinted in black ink, from a stencil from original linocut
it seems appropriate to include this work too.
See NGA website for further information about this work.
NOEL COUNIHAN (1913-1986)
Albert Namatjira on the Cross
serigraph from an edition of 50
Accompanied by a letter from the artist
41 x 18cm
Estimate $700-900
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Previously, we travelled with Stanley Kubrick's black rectangular monolith : from 1913 and the 'Black Square' of Kazimir Malevich to the new Black Pavilion of the Antipodes at the Venice Biennale.
Yesterday, on the The Music Show, Andrew Ford interviewed the English composer and Orthodox priest Ivan Moody (listen here). We appreciated his summary description of the 'Black Square', highlighted in the extract below :
Andrew Ford : As you point out in the book (Modernism and Orthodox Spirituality in Contemporary Music), in Soviet Russia the ikons of Orthodox religion were replaced by the iconography of the Soviet System, and Christ was replaced by Lenin, and in a way this brings Religion and Modernism together, doesn't it, because they were both suppressed.
Ivan Moody : They were both suppressed and, just before they were, you had these interesting phenomena such as the Malevich 'Black Square' which is an ikon that has disappeared into itself; because when it was displayed in its first exhibition it was displayed in the corner of the gallery as though it were in an ikon corner. And there you have the two resonances meeting head on.
In the previous post, we might also have included among those black milestones the iconic 1880 iron mask made by Ned Kelly, and Sidney Nolan's later
refinement of it.
FIAPCE
Recently, we acquired some 1950s-60s catalogs of the Herald Outdoor Art Show (Melbourne).
photo from Rennie Ellis collection at the State Library of Victoria
Tim Burstall writes about this exhibition series in 'The Memoirs of a Young Bastard'. A footnote there describes it thus :
Herald Outdoor Art Competition : The first outdoor art show organised by the Herald, then Melbourne's afternoon daily newspaper, was held from 8-14 December 1953 in the Treasury Gardens. It was conceived as a democratic event, with no restrictions on entry and no fees, commissions or rents. There were separate sections for amateur and professional exhibitors, a number of practising artists were invited to display their works in the latter category.
The 94 page catalogue for the 1953 event details around 2000 exhibits from artists who included George Bell, Charles Blackman, Arthur Boyd, Guy Boyd, John Brack, Ola Cohn, Noel Counihan, Sybil Craig, Leonard French, Barry Humphries, Bruce Petty, Clifton Pugh, various Skippers and Danila Vasilieff...
photo from Rennie Ellis collection at the State Library of Victoria
Alan McCulloch was appointed art critic at the Herald in 1952, the year before the Herald Outdoor Art Show began. McCulloch designed the covers and the inside drawings of the four catalogs we own.
One of the covers particularly interests us with its variants of the black square. Earthy brown, black and white : a black cosmic watering-can with no visible means of support hovers above and nurtures a variety of black plants in a variety of black pots.
That metaphor seems clear enough; the back cover less so, and more interesting for that. Thoughts of Malevich's 'Black Square'; of Nolan's black Kelly mask with eye; of Joseph Campbell's 'The Masks of God' (1962-1968) with an Eye of God and a rectangular halo; and the black rectangular pot (Created in the Image of God) containing a Tree of Life, the gift being offered to us. Archetypes find their way through : in the beginning was the Black Square and the Black Square was made ...
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Today is Good Friday.
some scenes and meta-scenes from
The Stations of the Projection-Space :
'Simon of Cyrene Helps Jesus Carry the Cross'
Titian, c. 1565
The Logos speaks to his disciples / The weight of
the projection-space is borne by the curators
The Logos carries the Projection-Space
FIAPCE -1977-
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Marie's words to Jeanne have long since reached the sea and returned into the various atmospheres.
Art is dead, Long live Art!
Verbum mortuum est, dum vivat.
The great circulation of language continues. Below, a new reign falls upon the ground of all, and on those standing around; on the dog, too.
In 1808, Théâtre des Acteurs de Regard proposed that this monument should be inscribed with a poem beginning
'Passants, contemplez cette pyramide…'
'Passers by, contemplate this pyramid...'
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...but it never eventuated.
A.B. is writing to chere Leontine : the fall of words align with the obelisk (atopped by the funerary vase intended to hold the bullet-pierced heart of Louis Desaix ...but it never eventuated) and with the rood tree, stripped and strung with the lines of the new langue : telegraph, telephone and electrification.
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D H, when he had done his work, carved his initials into that tree. Daniel Hopfer (c. 1470 – 1536) was a German artist who is widely believed to have been the first to use etching in printmaking. (Wikipedia)
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- after Tachihara KYOSHO
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Not to be missed!
at The Ian Potter Museum of Art
University of Melbourne
until 23 February 2014
,-1937_Transformations_exhibition-at-Potter-MU_400.jpg)
Attributed to Makani Wilingarr
Ngarra minytji (Ngarra ceremony design) 1937
natural pigments of bark, 127 x 64.2 cm
The Donald Thomson Collection, the University of Melbourne and Museum Victoria
© Courtesy Jimmy Burinyila, Ramingining
For more, see and read New lines of flight by Henry Skerritt (Art Guide Australia).
photo : Viki Petherbridge
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