Today we went to the Art Gallery of NSW with Annie, a mate who's out from Scotland. (Her Mum is fairly ill and Annie wants to be here rather than half way around the world.) The Archibald and Sulman have recently been judged and entrants are currently being shown. There is some amazing work on display - but I found I had really only one comment: why is it that artists who choose to do a self portrait feel they need to do it of themselves in the nude? Annie suggested it might have something to do with the outward looking nature of artists generally - their willingness to "exhibit". I guess that makes sense.
As well as the Prize exhibits, we also went for a walk through the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders gallery - and there was some wonderful work in here as well. It's interesting to see the way that aboriginal art seems to have been influenced by non-aboriginal artists. The "Fruit Bats" is amazing and I'm sorry that the piece is only available as a "poster" - although it will look wonderful on the wall of my office!
I am always amazed by how many ideas are floating around "out there" and how it is that artists come to record them - through a variety of media. It's also amazing how people have different reactions to the same pieces - I guess art appreciation is based on many things - including one overheard comment "there's lots of stupid stuff here".
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