Denise M Taylor

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Another Christmas is behind us. January, and a hot, dry Melbourne summer are upon us again. Howard Arkley’s air-brushed, brightly-coloured pictorial images of triple-fronted brick veneer Melbourne homes remind me of when I was younger, and the route I regularly walked from the bus stop to the local swimming pool. I would marvel at those cream-brick, highly-prized family havens. Today, […]

Categories: Musings on Art

Entering The University of Melbourne’s Ian Potter Museum of Art, I walked upstairs and entered a darkened room: soft light illuminated the central glass case containing a small medieval prayer book opened to reveal a biblical scene in brilliant colour, painted on parchment. I could just see the crimson velvet binding around the edge of the cover, and I imagined […]

Categories: Musings on Art

In conjunction with the National Gallery of Victoria’s current exhibition, ‘Medieval Moderns: The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood’, which I reviewed in a recent post, The University of Melbourne’s Faculty of Arts has organised a two-day symposium opening with a keynote address tomorrow night, 2 July at 6.30 pm. I will be presenting a paper on Saturday afternoon at 2.00 pm, the details of […]

Categories: Musings on Art

In 1848, inspired by medieval art and literature, seven young British artists formed the semi-secret Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB). Together they explored new ways of ensuring that visual truth could be better expressed through a more realistic, less idealised art, which had been previously defined by the standards of classicism and High Renaissance art. During a time of profound change in […]

Categories: Musings on Art

Spanning one long white wall, painted cross-form stars crowd vertical rectangles of bark after bark, giving the effect of twinkling stars moving across the night sky; on the opposite wall, shimmering cross-hatched lines painted on barks using earth ochres, mimic the ancient rippling of land in one of the driest areas of Australia, hardened by the sun, but saved by […]

Categories: Musings on Art

A dynasty is defined as a family spanning a number of generations—the most notable dynasties have the trappings of wealth, power and ambition. But the Boyd family, a complex network of artistic individuals often referred to as Australia’s pre-eminent dynasty of artists, does not bode well with the label of ‘dynasty’. A new exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria […]

Categories: Musings on Art

Face masks of dough, wire and the Australian flag; portraits of royalty dripping with black paint; veils, dots and paper cut-outs masking memory and identity; videos hinting at masked abuses in Australia’s history—these are a few of the contemporary art works by approximately 20 Australian artists on display at the TarraWarra Museum of Art (TWMA) Biennial 2014 exhibition, ‘Whisper in […]

Categories: Musings on Art

Nature is being exploited by a greedy world; its original abundance is now close to exhaustion. Artist Nita Jawary celebrates the power of nature to replenish itself in her new exhibition, ‘Exuberance! A celebration of nature in paint’. Nita greets me at the door of the Leo Baeck Arts Centre in Kew with her usual penetrating gaze, yet kindly disposition. […]

Categories: Musings on Art

As I wing over to London I think back on the whirlwind that was New York. For 10 days I criss-crossed Manhattan, visiting different areas each day, observing the art that is unique to each area: Greenwich Village, SoHo, Little Italy, Chelsea, Battery Park, Central Park, Uptown, Midtown, Downtown, East Side and West Side . . . I have already […]

Categories: Musings on Art

Regarding the weather, my second day in New York was the same as the first, one of those perfect early summer days with a deep blue sky and little humidity. The day began with a gentle sea breeze on my face as I gazed at the lady of Liberty from the deck of the Staten Island ferry: that enduring emblem […]

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