Perhaps a re-writing of history? The I am from Self portrait (But I always wanted to be one of the good guys) is replaced with We all are. Gordon Bennett born Australia 1955 Possession Island 1991 oil and synthetic polymer paint on canvas (a-b) 162.0 x 260.0 cm (overall) Museum of Sydney on the site of first Government House, Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales. Gordon Bennett, &The manifest toe, pp. In Interior (Abstract eye), 1991 a diagrammatic grid overlays an image depicting a group of Aboriginal people in the landscape, seemingly appropriated from a social studies text. People tend to focus on the emotional aspect rather than the conceptual when interpreting my work, and that bothers me. Examine a range of Bennetts artworks and their titles and discuss how the titles might provide a useful starting point for analysing and interpreting the images. When Gordon Bennett was labelled an Aboriginal Artist he was othered as an Aborigine and all the preconceptions that entails. Bennett was in possession of all four, all of which will become evident upon a glance at a summary of his life. Home Dcor (Algebra) Ocean, 1998 synthesises the work of Piet Mondrian(18721944), Margaret Preston (18751963) and later in the series, JeanMichel Basquiat(19601988) among others. He tried a career as an actuarial clerk, attending Hawthorn College after Balwyn State School. It is said that as a concession to Ireland ( because racing was illegal on British public roads) the British adopted shamrock green as their racing colour. This approach involved a flattening of the picture surface and often the use of disparate visual elements or styles borrowed or copied from different sources. Gordon Bennett, The manifest toe, p. 27, Identities come from somewhere, have histories, and like everything which is historical, they undergo constant transformation. Particularly when academics claim that they are afraid of expressing their 'true' findings for fear of losing their careers. Against the background of the illusionistic representation of the landscape they capture our attention, alerting us to the fact that there are other ways of representing and understanding the landscape not just the European perspectives that have dominated our cultural history. The grid and perspective lines are another recurring symbol in Bennetts work. In Unassailable heroes (Sweet Damper) Famous since Captain Cook, 1996 the motifs and symbols suggest issues and questions related to history and representation that concern Bennett. How do these systems/conventions reflect values and ideas important to that culture? How does this interpretation and analysis compare to your own? While some people may argue this has been a quick road to success, and that my work is authorised by my Aboriginality, I maintain that I dont have to be an Aborigine to do what I do, and that quick success is not an inherent attribute of an Aboriginal heritage, as history has shown, nor is it that unusual for college graduates who have something relevant to say. However, while apparently recognising and presenting these motifs/symbols as signifiers of meaning, Citizen does not appear to have the same interest as Bennett in interrogating the systems and values these motifs represent or the role they have played in shaping identity, history and understanding. They are strategically and prominently placed at the centre top of each panel, each radiating an aura of light created by white dots. Bennett indicates the need to be reconciled within the context of culture and history to develop a full sense of identity. However, he offers more than one interpretation of the grids use, which is indicated by the sampling of works by Australian artist Margaret Preston . At the time the A$ 1.3 million purchase price was the highest ever paid for a piece of modern art within Australia and the U.S. A fleet of tall ships sailed around Australia as part of the commemoration of settlement. These sources included social studies texts. Would you include work by Gordon Bennett in a text book on Australian history. 20-21, Gordon Bennett, The manifest toe in Ian McLean & Gordon Bennett, The Art of Gordon Bennett, Craftsman House, 1996, p. 33, Ian McLean, Towards an Australian postcolonial art in Ian McLean & Gordon Bennett, The Art of Gordon Bennett, Craftsman House, 1996, p. 99, Gordon Bennett, The manifest toe in The Art of Gordon Bennett, p. 22, Zara Stanhope, How do you think it feels? in Three Colours , Gordon Bennett & Peter Robinson (exh. From the beginning of his career, John Citizen had had a complex relationship with Gordon Bennett. He described his upbringing as overwhelmingly Euro-Australian, with never a word spoken about my Aboriginal heritage. That's probably why he is hardly a household name, despite the cognoscenti referring to him as a powerfully influential figure in contemporary art. What is your personal interpretation of the abstract paintings? Gordon Bennett 1. Bennetts portrait of himself as a four- year old boy dressed as a cowboy as the I is juxtaposed with images of Aborigines as the AM. But in Bennetts painting disparate diagrams, symbols and images disrupt the illusion, presenting the landscape as a site where many ideas and viewpoints compete. The distorted and exaggerated features of the form incorporate qualities that appear animal and human, male and female. I decided that I would attempt to create a space by adopting a strategy of intervention and disturbance in the field of representation through my art. One of the most heroic and well-known images of Australias past is Captain Cook landing in Botany Bay in 1770. One reason is that I felt I had gone as far as I could with the postcolonial project I was working through. He used familiar and recognisable images that are part of an Australian consciousness to explore and question the meaning of these images. This led him to adopt an artistic alter ego, John Citizen. Although there are many forms of Aboriginal art, dot painting is widely seen as synonymous with Aboriginal art since the late 1970s, when the dot painting of the Western Desert attracted unprecedented national and international interest in Aboriginal art. Learn How rich is He in this year and how He spends money? Fri. 10-9, Sat. 'Bloodlines' Samuel Calverts engraving, Captain Cook taking possession of the Australian continent on behalf of the British Crown AD 1770, became the starting point for Bennetts exploration. It confronts the bigotry and discrimination suffered by Aborigines, using a rich visual language based in both Aboriginal and Western traditions. The juxtaposition and sequencing of words and images in Untitled is unsettling. Gordon Bennett, Possession Island (1991)*. In the following year he was awarded the prestigious Mot et Chandon prize with his painting The Nine Ricochets (Fall down black fella, jump up white fella), 1990. Egyptian painting or relief sculpture, Chinese scroll paintings, Aboriginal painting of the Western Desert. This approach to his work resists any classification or confinement according to style. Australian politics is fraught yet the Australian public is disengaged. 3 Baths. 35, 36. Some supporters applauded his escape but his claim that he left to pass on his knowledge about how to fight the Japanese - given his lack of success . Nearby Recently Sold Homes. Today. An Anthology of writings on Australian Art in the 1980s & 1990s, IMA Publishing, 2004, p. 273, Gordon Bennett, The manifest toe, Ian McLean & Gordon Bennett, The Art of Gordon Bennett Craftsman House, 1996, p. 58, Kelly Gellatly, Citizen in the making, p.18, Kelly Gellatly, Citizen in the making, p. 17, John Citizen artist profile, Sutton Gallery, Melbourne http://www.suttongallery.com.au/artists/artistprofile.php?id=39 accessed 29/11/07, Conversation Bill Wright talks to Gordon Bennett, in Kelly Gellatly with contributions by Bill Wright, Justin Clemens and Jane Devery, Gordon Bennett (exhib. The Bicentenary celebrations triggered increased activism, protests and public debate related to Indigenous issues. Discuss with reference to Possession Island. But this approach is central to the way many people describe and analyse his work. Gordon Bennett 3, Bennett married in 1977. Bennetts use of the grid in these and other artworks suggests questions and ideas. It demonstrates Bennetts understanding of the power of this image. Gordon Bennett 6, I first learnt about Aborigines in primary school, as part of the social studies curriculum I learnt that Aborigines had dark brown skin, thin limbs, thick lips, black hair and dark brown eyes. He has written of his approach to his work: Bennetts practice include painting, printmaking, drawing, video, performance, installation and sculpture, and challenges racial stereotypes and critically reflects on Australias history (official and unacknowledged) by addressing issues relating to the role of language and systems of thought in forging identity. Bennetts recent abstract paintings reflect links to a range of artists including Australians Robert McPherson, Emily Kam Kngwarray and Ronnie Tjampitjinpa, and International artist Frank Stella. In Notes to Basquiat (Jackson Pollock and his other) 2001, Bennett confronts these issues within a global context. Find out more about binary opposites and identify some binary opposites that you believe have had a significant influence on your understanding of the world. The purer the bloodlines, the more Aboriginal you were. The pair of outstretched arms and the diagrammatic outline of a cross- like form in the central panel of Triptych: Requieum, Of grandeur, Empire, 1989 alludes to the figure of Christ crucified on the cross, a common subject in Christian art. This includes a focus on the role and power of language, including visual representations, in shaping identity, culture and history. The triptych form of painting is most commonly associated with the altarpiece paintings made for Christian churches. Australian artist Gordon Bennett passed away on June 3, 2014, from natural causes at the age of 58. Gordon Bennett an Australian Aboriginal artist demonstrates this theory through his work. For example, the association between the colour red and blood or violence is strongly influenced by the many representations and descriptions we are exposed to in Western culture, in which blood or violence is described/represented using the colour red. Gordon Bennett did not describe himself as an appropriation artist. Neither had I thought to question the representation of Aborigines as the quintessential primitive Other against which the civilized collective Self of my peers was measured. There is strong symbolism associated with the placement of the figure beneath the Roman triumphal arch. Bennett has included the framed photograph in the panel, to the right of the painted figure. Black angels replace traditional white cherubs. Create an artwork in a medium of your choice that highlights how the meanings, values and ideas associated with these binary opposites influence perception and understanding. Research the significant dates/events referenced in Bennetts artworks, including Myth of the Western Man (White mans burden) 1992 for some ideas. Bennett used Blue Poles to recall this period of change. He quotes directly from this image, which is in fact a copy of a copy, as Samuel Calvert copied this image of Captain Cook landing in Botany Bay from an image by Gilfillan, which is now lost. Bennett as a cultural outsider of both his Aboriginal and AngloCeltic heritage does not assume a simplistic interpretation of identity. Gordon Bennett Possession Island (Abstraction) 1991 Oil paint and acrylic paint on canvas 1 843 x 1845 mm Tate and the Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, purchased jointly with funds provided by the Qantas Foundation 2016 Estate of Gordon Bennett CZ: A lot of the featured artists have also created work since 1992. Include a selection of relevant artworks by Gordon Bennett to illustrate your timeline. Theyre buried, and this is a way of bringing them back into memory, but remembered in a different way from the way that I was taught, looking at them from a different angle and looking at how they work, where they came from initially, and how these images still support contemporary stereotypes, etc. cat. The viewer does not confront the artist, but self. In the context of the other panels, which are all figurative, this black square could be seen as an absence, and possibly a representation of the oppression of indigenous voices by history. Purchased with funds from the Foundation for the Historic Houses Trust, Museum of Sydney Appeal, 2007. It was a way forward for me. The Other is clearly marked out as not only different but by necessity inferior. Gordon Bennetts Possession Island 1991, highlights the influence that visual images have on our understanding of history, and the way that visual images often reflect the values of the social / historical context in which they are made. The Estate of Gordon Bennett. The pale, marble- like sculpted heads on the bed remind us of the Classical art and learning that has been privileged in Western culture above other forms of art and learning, including those associated with Indigenous cultures. Symbols such as these highlight his awareness and use of visual images, forms and elements as signs. These contrasting and complex meanings and ideas are not accidental. Many Indigenous Australians saw this appropriation as further evidence of a justification of colonisation and a Eurocentric interpretation of Aboriginal culture. Ian McLean 2. Who was Paul Keating? For Mondrian the grid became the essence of all forms. Identify other artists who have used dots in their work (ie. The Stripe series of abstract paintings represents a kind of freedom for me as an artist. How ideas might be encountered from different places and events interest him. Bennetts referencing, appropriation and recontextualisation of familiar images and art styles challenges conventional ways of viewing and thinking and opens up new possibilities for understanding the subjects he explored. They communicated important Christian stories to the congregation. In many images of the crucifixion, including the painting by Veneziano illustrated, Mary Magdalene is kneeling at the foot of the cross washing and anointing Christs feet in an act of devotion . Nov 26, 2012 - The paintings of Gordon Bennett are loaded with graphic detail. He used his self as the vehicle to do so. From early on in his successful career, curtailed by his death in 2014 at age 58, he was well-known for disrupting the status quo with his unique visual language. He holds a large whip with which he regularly lashes out at a black, coffin- like box. Do these qualities reflect the reality of what it means to be Australian (ie. Traditionally these arches were built by the Romans to celebrate victory in war. Every object is carefully and clearly painted, yet the images conceptually blur together as they intersect and interlace through the grid, across the canvas. This education resource accompanies the retrospective exhibition Gordon Bennett (2008) which showcased 85 works by this internationally acclaimed Australian artist. Finally, Ive never been one to make art about art before. Brushing aside the tempting opportunity to ridicule many frames of reference in that sentence (I mean, don't get me . John Citizen was a work in progress that allows me to follow other streams of thought in my practice. However the hand in the opposite panel controls and threatens the Aboriginal figure represented as a jack- in- the- box. She was once thought to be the last surviving Tasmanian Aborigine. John Citizen is an artist for our times: he reflects back to us citizens the white Australia of the postKeating era. As one of the dispossessed within this biased history, he claims that his only tool to combat this bias was the art of mimicry. My intention is in keeping with the integrity of my work in which appropriation and citation, sampling and remixing are an integral part, as are attempts to communicate a basic underlying humanity to the perception of blackness in its philosophical and historical production within western cultural contexts. The other was 'Number . The coming of the light refers ironically to a term used by Torres Strait Islanders to describe the arrival of the missionaries who brought Christianity to the Islands in 1871. Why? Mondrian cages the figures, Preston objectifies the figures; Bennett accommodates both to grasp the intangible and dissect these limited interpretations and stereotypes. Underlying Bennetts admiration for Basquiat was the need to re- contextualise the issues that he had explored throughout his career as an artist. The effect is that they dissolve into a mass of colour, dots and slashes of paint . while Bennett may have attempted, in recent years, to disconnect from the politics of his earlier practice, there is also a sense within these paintings, of the impossibility of such a task. This activity could be done as a group activity with different students researching different dates/events and presenting talks to the class about their significance. The first panel of Bennetts triptych, Requiem, depicts Trugannini (c. 1812 1876), a Palawa woman from Tasmania. At the heart of the artwork of Gordon Bennett is a journey to find that self amidst the cultural and historical inequities created by European settlement in Australia. 4. He drew on and sampled from many artists and traditions to create a new language and a new way of reading these images. Here Bennett raises questions and matters about the stories that define us personally and culturally, and about the complex relationship that has existed between the Christian church and Indigenous cultures through history. He lived and worked in Brisbane. Bloody handprints are stamped across the walls. James Gordon Bennett Performance with object for the expiation of guilt (Violence and grief remix) 1996, is a remix of an earlier video performance work, Performance with object for the expiation of guilt, 1995. Even when the starting point for a work is an emotive one, I believe I conceptually examine the ideas behind the emotion and extrapolate from there Gordon Bennett1. Blood is a potent symbol and has historically been a measure of Aboriginality. He is not disturbed by slashes of paint, but painted carefully and outlined by the precise grid behind him. I didnt go to art college to graduate as an Aboriginal Artist. He painted his most famous work, Guernica (1937), in response to the Spanish Civil War; the totemic grisaille canvas remains a definitive work of anti-war art. The Notes to Basquiat: 911 series and the Camouflage series, which reflect on the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 and the war in Iraq respectively, highlight Bennetts global perspective. However, for Bennett, dot painting also became a powerful expression of the connections between nature and culture, which are integral to representation in Aboriginal art. Watch. The images include historical footage of Indigenous people and details of some of Bennetts own paintings. Basquiats signature crown hovers beneath a tag-like image of fire. There are many visual signs that recur throughout Bennetts artworks, including: Each of these signs brings significant meaning to Bennetts work and plays an important role in his investigation of issues and ideas related to identity, understanding and perception. The resource provides frameworks for exploring key issues and ideas in Bennett's art practice. The artist has effectively communicated his beliefs on the suppression of Aboriginal culture by combining confronting imagery with the concepts of Vincent Van Gogh, Francisco Goya and Classical art. Bennett continued to work in new ways with materials, techniques and images throughout his career. The The Notes to Basquiat series,which Bennett commenced in 1998, marked a significant new direction in his art in relation to working with the style of another artist. Experiment with enhancing or diminishing different layers to create a distinctive character. Bennetts interest in adopting a strategy of intervention and disturbance in the field of representation manifests in many different ways in his art. Touch device users, explore by touch or with swipe gestures. While personal experience has had a significant influence on Gordon Bennetts art practice, the autobiographical aspects of his work are framed by bigger ideas and questions that have relevance and significance beyond Bennetts own experience. From early in his career he was inspired by theories and ideas associated with postmodernism. The grotesque also interested Bennett as a means of disrupting conventional ways of seeing and understanding. Bennetts grid formations seem to imprison the figures within the canvas. In Altered body print (Shadow figure howling at the moon) Bennett focuses more explicitly on binary opposites and the associations they trigger. As the foundation of a system of representation, perspective produces an illusion of depth on an essentially flat two dimensional surface by the use of invisible lines that converge to a vanishing point. So, painting in an overtly abstract manner was a way to go silent on the issues involved and yet still keep painting. Bennetts final year at art college in 1988 coincided with the Bicentenary of European settlement of Australia. Gordon Bennett 3. The vanishing point may also be understood as the point from which these lines extend outward past the picture plane to include the viewer in the pictorial space, positioned as observer of a self contained harmonious whole. John Citizen lets me take my Australian citizenship and cultural upbringing back from the netherworld of the imagined Other. Suggest reasons for the similarities and differences that you find. After working in various trades in his early life, Bennett enrolled as a matureage student at Queensland College of Art in 1986 and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts (Fine Arts) degree in 1988. Gordon Bennett Number Nine, 2008 Acrylic paint on linen 71 9/10 119 7/10 in | 182.5 304 cm Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA) The Rocks Get notifications for similar works Create Alert Want to sell a work by this artist? These joint acquisitions by MCA and Tate include two large video installations, one by Susan Norrie (Transit 2011) and another by Vernon Ah Kee (tall man 2010), two paintings by Gordon Bennett (Possession Island (Abstraction) 1991 and Number Nine 2008) and an artist book by Judy Watson consisting of sixteen etchings with chine coll (a . He found this liberating. Discuss with reference to one or more works by Bennett. The works I have produced are notes, nothing more, to you and your work Gordon Bennett 1. This is similar to the way a Pointillist painting can only be seen effectively from a distance to bring the image into focus. . SOLD FEB 21, 2023. For more information, visit: www.qagoma.qld.gov.au for details. Compare and contrast this artists use of appropriation with that of Gordon Bennett. Bennetts art engages with historical and contemporary questions of cultural and personal identity, with a specific focus on Australias colonial past and its postcolonial present. In just three generations, that heritage has been lost to me. Typical of Bennetts early work, the painting appropriates an existing picture, in this case an historical painting, and transforms the content with carefully considered signs of Aboriginal identity. Mixing of pure blood with European blood was feared by Europeans, authenticity was at risk and identity diluted. Once again the letters A B C D feature as a potent symbol and complete the grid. Explain. Physically, the kitsch Aboriginal motifs copied from Preston are trapped. During 199495 at summer school Bennett learnt to make digital videos on an Apple PowerMac computer. He was born in New York, May 10th 1841 and died 4 days after his 77th Birthday in Beaulieu near Nizza/France. New perspectives on familiar images and stories are presented. However, Bennetts ongoing investigation into questions of identity, perception and knowledge, has involved a range of subjects drawn from both history and contemporary culture, and both national and international contexts. Like many of his own and earlier generations, Bennetts understanding of the nations history was partly shaped by the sort of images commonly found in history books. Purchased with funds from the Foundation for the Historic Houses Trust, Museum of Sydney Appeal, 2007 The persistence of language references the way language controls and defines how we understand ourselves and our world. They powerfully describe pain and violence. His status as an artist has been elevated to hero with his contribution to Action Painting. Gordon Bennett arrived on Christmas Island in 1979 to take a post as leader of the Union of Christmas Island Workers. This pastiche of style and image is like a D J (Disc Jockey) sampling and remixing different styles of music to create new expressions. GORDON BENNETT AND HIS RACES From the Book: Die Gordon Bennett Ballon Rennen (The Gordon Bennett Races)by Ulrich Hohmann Sr along with articles by others.Many of his contemporaries have considered Mister James Gordon Bennett to be a spleeny American. a moment of possession; the place where he came ashore and allegedly claimed . Here he is concealed under blocks of black, red and yellow, the colours of the Aboriginal flag. As a shy and inarticulate teenager my response to these derogatory opinions was silence, self-loathing and denial of my heritage. This culminated in the Notes to Basquiat series in 2003. Pinterest. I am purposely not defining him only as Aboriginal because he himself does not want to be defined only as such. This was common practice among young Aboriginal girls and women. Research references to existing images in Gordon Bennetts The nine richochets (Fall down black fella, jump up white fella) 1990.