Know My Name

Making it Modern

Major Exhibition
5 Aug – 8 Oct 2023
Four panels of screens painted with oils, featuring various trees and flora

Grace Cossington Smith, Four panels for a screen: loquat tree, gum and wattle trees, waterfall, picnic in a gully, 1929, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1976

‘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

About

Know My Name: Making it Modern celebrates pioneering women artists who changed the course of modern art in Australia.

Drawn from the national collection, this major exhibition profiles Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme, Margaret Preston, Grace Cossington Smith, Clarice Beckett and Olive Cotton, their works unified by their expressions of daily life, nature, still life and interior worlds of place, mind and imagination.

From dramatic prints by Margaret Preston, to evocative photographs of Olive Cotton, to Grace Cossington Smith’s radiant paintings, and the poetic atmosphere of Clarice Beckett’s works, Making it Modern presents each artist’s distinctive approach to their artistic practice and what it meant to be a modern woman in their times.

Making it Modern continues to build on the National Gallery’s Know My Name initiative which celebrates the work of all women artists with an aim to enhance understanding of their contribution to Australia’s cultural life.

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

Exhibition Guide

Artists

Clarice Beckett
Artist Profile

Grace Cossington Smith
Creator Profile

An abstract image of a woman's side profile, she has brown hair and is wearing a decorative garment

Olive Cotton
Creator Profile

Photo of round-lens glasses drawing a long shadow

Margaret Preston
Creator Profile

Multicoloured print of a large Bird soaring through a series of flowers

Ethel Spowers
Creator Profile

Eveline Syme
Creator Profile

Events

Publications

Know My Name

With profiles and essays on more than 150 women artists by 115 women writers, this book seeks to retell the story of Australian art through the work of women. Part of a series of ongoing gender equity initiatives by the National Gallery, it aspires to make the art of women better known in the wider community, and to counter the dominance of art historical displays emphasising men. By turning the tables, we present an opportunity to reckon with the strength and breadth of women's contributions to the art of this country.

PUBLISHED JUNE 2022
458 pages
311 x 238 x 44 mm
Full Colour | Hardback
RRP A$79.95*

*Members discount available for publication purchases made at the Gallery in the Art Store only.

Purchase Know My Name

Spowers & Syme

This beautifully illustrated catalogue celebrates the artistic friendship of Melbourne artists Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme. Two women from rival media families who pioneered modern printmaking in Australia and whose prints, drawings and paintings, remarkable for their expressive energy, capture the zeitgeist of the interwar years.

PUBLISHED AUGUST 2021
96 pages
240 x 195 mm
Full Colour | Hardback
RRP A$39.99*
ISBN 9780646842189

*Members discount available for publication purchases made at the Gallery in the Art Store only.

Purchase Spowers & Syme
Photograph of three versions of the same book, all in different colours. One is standing upright on top of two laying flat.
Detail photo of open page of the Know My Name book
Detail photo of open page of the Know My Name book
Colour photo of Spowers and Syme catalogue cover
Photo of catalouge page showing colourful artwork and text
Photo of Catalouge pages with colourful artwork and text

Stories & Ideas

Essay

Clarice Beckett

Abstract view of a sunset with pink and purple hues

Deirdre Cannon discusses the role of women in Clarice Beckett's life, shedding fresh light on her art.

Read Time: 35 minutes
Essay

Colour, rhythm, and spirit
Unravelling Grace Cossington Smith’s sketchbook annotations

A sketch of a woman in a woven hat

Unravelling Grace Cossington Smith's sketchbook annotations.

Read Time: 33 minutes
Essay

Olive Cotton: Resisting definition

Curator Shaune Lakin discusses the small of acts of resistance evident in the work of artist Olive Cotton.

Read Time: 31 minutes
Essay

Grace and force

Sarina Noordhuis-Fairfax discusses Modernist pioneers Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme.

Read Time: 27 minutes
Feature

At the Cutting Edge

Linocut print of child watching the silhouette of other children playing behind a bamboo screen

The creative alliance of Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme brought the linocut to Australia while sparking a new acceptance of modernist art forms.

Read Time: 13 minutes
In Conversation

The Curator Series

Get to know the National Gallery curatorial team as they share insights into key works from the collection.

Read Time: 30 minutes
Article

Prints, pigments & poison
Conserving the vibrant works by Ethel Spowers and Eveline Syme

Print of children wearing green and black playing tug of war

Andrea Wise, Senior Conservator, Paper, explains the conservation preparation for the Spowers & Syme exhibition.

Read Time: 8 minutes

Watch

Dr Deborah Hart on Grace Cossington Smith's Interior in yellow

Clarice Beckett Conservation

Sarina Noordhuis-Fairfax on Ethel Spowers

Dr Deborah Hart on Grace Cossington Smith's Sydney Harbour Bridge

Sarina Noordhuis-Fairfax on Eveline Syme

Works of Art

Clarice Beckett, Evening landscape, c 1925, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1974

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

Clarice Beckett, Not titled (Sherbrooke Forest), c 1919–1935, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, gift of Mrs Hilda Mangan 1972

A blurry painting of a seascape with rivers edge and tree hanging to the left.

Clarice Beckett, Beaumaris seascape, c 1925, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1971

A soft painting of a seaside

Clarice Beckett, Not titled (Seascape), c 1919–1935, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, gift of Mrs Hilda Mangan 1972

A soft painting of a street and telegraph poles

Clarice Beckett, Not titled (Road with telegraph poles), c 1932, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, gift of Mrs Hilda Mangan 1972

A bright and colourful painting of a road in Sydney

Grace Cossington Smith, Eastern Road, Turramurra, c.1926, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, bequest of Mervyn Horton, 1984

The interior of a bedroom with bookshelves, Window and Bed; painted in choppy strokes of yellow, green, blue and red

Grace Cossington Smith, Interior in yellow, 1962-64, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1965

An abstract image of a woman's side profile, she has brown hair and is wearing a decorative garment

Grace Cossington Smith, Study of a head: self-portrait, 1916, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased with funds from the Marie and Vida Breckenridge bequest 2010

Ethel Spowers, The bamboo blind, 1926, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1976

Ethel Spowers Bank holiday, 1935 National Gallery of Australia, Canberra purchased 1976

Eveline Syme, The factory, 1933, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1979, © Estate of Eveline Syme

Photo of round-lens glasses drawing a long shadow

Olive Cotton, Glasses, 1937 prtd 1997, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 2016

Black and white photograph of a sleeping woman's torso

Olive Cotton, The sleeper, 1939, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. Purchased 1987

A photo of a shirtless man in black and white

Olive Cotton, Max, c. 1935, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1998

A photo of grass blowing in the sunlit breeze in black and white

Olive Cotton, Grass at sundown, 1939, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, gift of the artist 1987

A woodcut depicting various flowers in black on white with limited colours

Margaret Preston, Tea-tree and Hakea petiolaris, 1936, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased from Gallery adimission charges 1986 © Margaret Rose Preston Estate/Copyright Agency

A painting of a still life with flowers on a table

Margaret Preston, Still life, 1925, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, purchased 1980 © Margaret Rose Preston Estate/Copyright Agency

A woodcut depicting a scene of Sydney Bridge

Margaret Preston, Sydney Bridge, 1944, National Gallery of Australia, Kamberri/Canberra, bequest of Alan Queale 1982 © Margaret Rose Preston Estate/Copyright Agency

Supporters

Principal Patron

  • Tim Fairfax AC

Strategic Partners

Major Partner

Related

Know My Name Women Artists

Know My Name

A woman is sitting in font of a large wall of many portraits in a large gallery space
Australian Art /  Audio

The Shell
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Photo of the inside of a conch shell against a light

Published 26 July 2023

Audio Tour
2 minutes
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Grace Cossington Smith 'The Bridge in building'

Published 16 December 2010

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Max & Olive
The Photographic Life of Olive Cotton & Max Dupain

Past Exhibition
Photo of man lying with his head on his crossed arms

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Margaret Preston 'Dry river bed NT.'

Video still of painting.

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Past Exhibition

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Australian Art /  Video

Margaret Preston 'Flying over the Shoalhaven River'

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Grace Cossington Smith
A Retrospective Exhibition

Past Exhibition
The interior of a bedroom with bookshelves, Window and Bed; painted in choppy strokes of yellow, green, blue and red

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Essay

A Woman's Work

Read Time: 20 minutes
Feature

Australian Art
Curator Picks

Read Time: 21 minutes