Harbour views
06 December 2004
Australian landscape artist Tom Roberts recalled that his first meeting with Arthur Streeton, “was at Mentone ... He was standing out on the wet rocks, painting there, and I saw that his work was full of light and air. We asked him to join us and that was the beginning of a long and delightful association.”
Streeton - along with Frederick McCubbin, Charles Conder and Tom Roberts - was a leader of the Heidelberg School of Australian painting. Appearing at the turn of the century, the
Heidelberg School was an art movement that created some of the most iconic images of the Australian landscape ever imagined. Heavily influenced by French Impressionism, this group of artists were among the first to develop a visual language that captured the rugged allure of the Australian wilderness.
Yet although Streeton may be best known for his contribution to the Heidelberg School, his practice was not restricted to images of the bush. Arthur Streeton and the Australian Coast offers a complete re-examination of Streeton’s output, bringing together historic paintings as well as other, more intimate works that drew upon events from the artist’s life.
With fifty-five paintings on display, the exhibition includes images of his beloved Sydney Harbour, created whilst a resident during the 1890s. One of Streeton’s earliest works Mentone Beach (1886), is conceivably the same work that the artist was working on when he first met Roberts. The exhibition also features a major painting of the Tasmanian coast, one of the largest the artist ever completed, which followed Streeton’s first aeroplane flight.
The retropsective includes a group of sixteen paintings (many of which have come from private collections) of Sydney Harbour from between 1892 and 1896. They were produced whilst Streeton lived in a tent for four years at Curlew Camp on the shores of Sirius Cove in Mosman.
Two of Streeton’s most critically acclaimed paintings of Sydney Harbour (which were exhibited at the Royal Academy in London and Societe Nationale des Beaux Artes in Paris respectively) will be hung together for the first time. Streeton completed the paintings within several days of one another after his return from London in 1906. Also, a critical series of largely unknown images of the Australian coastline – showing views of Portsea, Sorrento, Lorne, Port Campbell and Palm Beach – are to be exhibited. Many of these works have not been seen in public since they were initially purchased by private collectors in the 1920s and 1930s.
Geoffrey Smith, Curator of Australian Art at the National Gallery of Victoria and the artist’s grandson, Oliver Streeton, have worked for over three years to put together this major exhibition for the Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery.
More Information
Arthur Streeton and the Australian Coast
11 December – 6 March 2005
Mornington Peninsula Regional Gallery, Dunns Rd, Mornington
Details: (03) 03 5975 4395
Website: http://mprg.mornpen.vic.gov.au/
