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Australians seems to appreciate messy paintings
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I lived in Sydney for three years and worked quite hard to discover exactly what the Aussie sensibilities toward visual arts were. The Art Gallery of New South Wales, with its very substantial collection of the sort of art that would be appreciated by anyone who visits and enjoys SOG, was always jam-packed with people, and deservedly so, whereas across the quay, the museum of contemporary art was generally full of echoes and a collection of "pieces" that pretty much explained the echoes and the precarious financial picture of the museum. So there was hope -- at least until the Archibald exhibition (for those unfamiliar, an annual portraiture contest with substantial prize and notoriety) was hung and the "winner" selected, almost always a piece that perhaps we might here just charitably characterize as "messy". (But the People's Choice was almost always, again, of the caliber of the work of SOG artists.)
It was my discovery of the "unmessy" Australian Heidelberg School (late 19th Century impressionists) that perhaps more than anything else stimulated an interest strong enough to convince me that I should quit doing what I had been doing, and begin serious study of painting. And indeed, when I returned to the U.S., I published an article (Spring 2001) in the Classical Realism Journal on the Heidelberg artists and, particularly, Sir Arthur Streeton. (The Journal is available through the American Society Classical Realism, see
www.classicalrealism.com )
Unfortunately, Streeton's originals are unavailable to me, so I settled for reproductions (though for reasons unknown to me, considering Streeton's stature in Australian art history, I never found any that did any sort of justice to the originals, which I viewed in Sydney, Canberra, and Melbourne.) On the other hand, I had access to the original work of the fantastic Australian plein air painter Warwick Fuller, and one of his paintings hangs on the wall of my much-missed house back in the U.S. I feel privileged to have both the Streeton reproduction and the original Fuller.
Perhaps, Margaret, you'd be willing to give an Aussie's viewpoint on the allure of Pro Hart's work. His P.R. hype machine would give Kinkade quite a run for his money, and though Hart's works are original (by which I mean merely that they're not reproductions), they are unconscionably overpriced, despite the fact that he's surely done virtually the same simple little knife painting a thousand times. I even encountered gallery employees who were at a loss to understand it, but of course they weren't complaining. I'd be quite more satisfied with a Streeton or Tom Roberts reproduction than a Hart original, any day.
I did rather enjoy some of Ken Done's work, but I don't have any originals, simply because -- and perhaps this comes full circle and "proves" the majority position in this thread -- I couldn't possibly afford them. But I do think that his incredible commercial success, not unlike Kinkade's, is part of the bone that seems to get stuck in the throats of detractors. I don't get that part.
My wife does, however, have a Ken Done golf polo shirt, and it's quite lovely(!).
Cheers,
Steven
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