Know My Name: Making It Modern

Media Kit

Clarice Beckett, Sandringham Beach, c 1933, oil on canvas, 55.8 x 50.9 cm, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, purchased 1971

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‘In each instance the artists convey a particular take on what it meant to be a modern woman in their times and in the making of their art.’

DEBORAH HART, HEAD CURATOR, AUSTRALIAN ART

Making it Modern is a Know My Name project celebrating the works of pioneering women artists who changed the course of modern art in Australia. Following the successful tour of Spowers & Syme, works by Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme will be shown in an expanded display, bringing a diverse spectrum of their dynamic works to light. Their art is shown in the context of the times and includes examples of significant works by avant-garde teachers such as Claude Flight and other artists from the Grosvenor School in London, as well as many of their Australian peers. Given the fragility of prints by Spowers and Syme, this will be the last opportunity for the breadth of their work to be shown for a decade.

Also included in the exhibition are highlights from the national collection by women artists, with a focus on Margaret Preston, Grace Cossington Smith, Clarice Beckett and Olive Cotton. The strength of our holdings is revealed in examples of these artist’s greatest works. The unifying threads are the ways in which these women engage with daily life, nature, still life and interior worlds of place, mind and imagination. Yet, each one of the artists brings a quite distinctive approach to their artistic practice: from dramatic prints by Margaret Preston, to evocative photographs of Olive Cotton, to the radiance of Grace Cossington Smith’s paintings, and the poetic atmosphere of Clarice Beckett’s works. In each instance the artists convey a particular take on what it meant to be a modern woman in their times and in the making of their art. These in-focus displays will also include works by other women artists, placing their art in a wider context of the times.

Curators:
Lead Curator, Dr Deborah Hart, Head Curator, Australian Art with:
Dr Sarina Noordhuis-Fairfax, Curator, Australian Prints and Drawings
Elspeth Pitt, Senior Curator, Australian Art
Dr Shaune Lakin, Senior Curator, Photography
Deirdre Cannon, Assistant Curator, Australian Art

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