From his father, a Scottish . In this way, Bennett effectively exposes and questions the constructed and value-laden nature of language and history, and how they shape our understanding of the world. Gordon Bennett, Possession Island #2, 1991. Gordon Bennett Possession Island (Abstraction), 1991 Oil and acrylic on canvas 71 7/10 71 7/10 in | 182 182 cm Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA) The Rocks Get notifications for similar works Create Alert Want to sell a work by this artist? The dresser draw labelled self is closed while the drawers for history and culture are ajar. His joy . From early in his career he was inspired by theories and ideas associated with postmodernism. Bennetts earliest works, including The coming of the light, 1987, reflect a raw and expressive style. For example, placing the word DISPLACE under the image of Captain Cook coming ashore at Botany Bay focuses attention on the dispossession of Aboriginal people rather than on the discovery of Australia. Nearby homes similar to 2719 NE 21st Ter have recently sold between $824K to $1M at an average of $565 per square foot. Like many others at that time, Bennett was inspired by the work of the historian Henry Reynolds. Reflecting the colours of the Aboriginal flag, splashes and drips of red, yellow and black paint across the surface of the painting quote the distinctive style of Jackson Pollock (19121956), which Bennett began to sample in 1990. He states: The traditionalist studies of Anthropology and Ethnography have thus tended to reinforce popular romantic beliefs of an authentic Aboriginality associated with the Dreaming and images of primitive desert people, thereby supporting the popular judgment that only remote fullbloods are real Aborigines. The work is a copy of a copy of a copy. The inclusion of Pollock helps build these cross- connections. While self- portraits usually address issues of personal identity, Bennett uses this form of representation to also look at issues of identity on a national scale. 40 41. Opens in a new window or tab. Discuss with reference to a range of artworks by Bennett. The repression of Aboriginal heritage that Bennett experienced was reinforced by an education system and society dominated by a history built on the belief in Australia as terra nullius. This purchase was indicative of a massive legislative reform program that had not been seen in Australian society for decades. James Gordon Bennett Quotes - BrainyQuote American - Editor May 10, 1841 - May 14, 1918 I have made mistakes but I have never made the mistake of claiming that I have never made one. Underlying Bennetts admiration for Basquiat was the need to re- contextualise the issues that he had explored throughout his career as an artist. Lists of words draw the viewer into a game of word association. Gewerblich. Appropriation art is an established postmodernist strategy defined as: The direct duplication, copying or incorporation of an image (painting, photography, etc) by another artist who represents it in a different context, thus completely altering its meaning and questioning notions of originality and authenticity.1. At the same time I have resisted being positioned as a spokesperson for my people since I do not have nor do I seek, such a mandate by declining to speak about my work. But in Bennetts painting disparate diagrams, symbols and images disrupt the illusion, presenting the landscape as a site where many ideas and viewpoints compete. This event was re-enacted in many pageants and dramatisations during Australias Bicentenary in 1988, as a way of celebrating 200 years of Australian history. What does Bennetts goal for his work suggest to you about how he views the role of art? As far as pinning down who John Citizen actually was, Im not interested in doing that. The Stripe series of abstract paintings represents a kind of freedom for me as an artist. The incorporation of Blue Poles calls to mind an era of great reform in Australian politics. What is your personal interpretation of the meaning and ideas in The coming of the light or Untitled ? 5. Collect and find photographs of a wide variety of people of different ethnicities, cultures and physical appearances. Dates/events to consider and research include the 1967 Australian Referendum, the 1992 Mabo and 1996 Wik Native Title court cases, Paul Keatings 1992 Redfern address. He was born in New York, May 10th 1841 and died 4 days after his 77th Birthday in Beaulieu near Nizza/France. Bloody handprints are stamped across the walls. Ian McLean 2. Who was Paul Keating? Select two artworks by Gordon Bennett that interest you and discuss how the artists personal background, postcolonialism and/or postmodernism provide a framework for the meanings, ideas and/or formal qualities you find in the artworks. Bennett investigates the way stereotypes are constructed by exploring words and images in opposites. Gordon Bennett Possession Island - Free download as Word Doc (.doc / .docx), PDF File (.pdf) or read online for free. Fri. 10-9, Sat. 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. Our understanding of the meanings associated with visual signs is linked to cultural codes, conventions and experience. 1 0-5-30 j RED STAR Now 35 oft on all RED STARRED SIWFMIMUIS IliMMS . Gordon Bennett arrived on Christmas Island in 1979 to take a post as leader of the Union of Christmas Island Workers. Gordon Bennett Possession Island (Abstraction) 1991 In Tate Modern Level 3: A Year in Art: Australia 1992 Level 3: A Year in Art: Australia 1992 Artist Gordon Bennett 1955-2014 Medium Oil paint and acrylic paint on canvas Dimensions Support: 1843 1845 mm Collection Tate Acquisition Mondrian cages the figures, Preston objectifies the figures; Bennett accommodates both to grasp the intangible and dissect these limited interpretations and stereotypes. Create an illustrated and annotated timeline of the history of Australia since settlement. Within the context of Australian art, he freed himself from being categorised solely as an Indigenous artist by creating an ongoing pop art-inspired alter ego named John Citizen. He is not disturbed by slashes of paint, but painted carefully and outlined by the precise grid behind him. This led him to adopt an artistic alter ego, John Citizen. Gordon Bennett, an Australian Aboriginal artist, demonstrates this theory through his work. The representation of Aborigines has been reduced to caricature. It acts as a question with many possibilities and answers. The Bicentenary celebrations triggered increased activism, protests and public debate related to Indigenous issues. Looking at the image from different viewpoints helps us to discover different perspectives. RM 2JEMG56 - A rare old photograph of the 1903 Gordon Bennett trophy race, Ireland - In the 'pits' attendants are cooling down an overheated vehicle with a bucket of water. 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. Research references to existing images in Gordon Bennetts The nine richochets (Fall down black fella, jump up white fella) 1990. The Constitution is being rethought with respect to Indigenous Australians, and treaty-making is on the agenda yet the Uluru Statement from the Heart was roundly ignored by the Federal Government. What legal, moral and ethical rights does an artist have to control the way their work is seen and viewed in exhibitions, books or online. That's probably why he is hardly a household name, despite the cognoscenti referring to him as a powerfully influential figure in contemporary art. 'Bloodlines' Explain how these images might have influenced perceptions of Australian identity? He described this knowledge as a psychic rupturing. Gordon Bennett 1, For an artist whose practice was concerned with how labels and systems define and confine knowledge and perception, labels and categorisations such as aboriginal artist, or urban aboriginal artist that were often applied to his work through exhibitions, books and other commentaries presented many practical as well as philosophical issues, I am very aware of the boundaries of critical containment within the parameters of Urban Aboriginal Art, and have so far worked within these boundaries to try and broaden, extend and subvert them. Using this list, find a range of artworks that you could appropriate to help communicate your personal identity visually. He drew on and sampled from many artists and traditions to create a new language and a new way of reading these images. 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. Do you agree? Oil and acrylic on canvas, 182 x 182 cm. The grotesque in art is generally associated with bizarre, ugly or disturbing imagery. Gordon Bennett (9 October 1955 - 3 June 2014) [1] was an Australian artist of Aboriginal and Anglo-Celtic descent. Get this The Morning News page for free from Friday, July 7, 1972 Q90 wSu Fairfax Shopping Center Doily 10-6. Further reading These act as disturbances. These paintings reflect Bennetts belief that after the Notes to Basquiat series of 2003, I had gone as far I could with the postcolonial project I was working through1. Such imagery has often been used by artists to unsettle the viewer and present new perspectives on familiar subjects. The resource provides frameworks for exploring key issues and ideas in Bennett's art practice. These binary opposites insider/outsider, black/white, primitive/civilised have had a powerful influence on perceptions of European and Indigenous people and culture. EUR 7,81. He carefully staged each image in his studio, posing the sitter against a painted backdrop. However these ideas and values simultaneously oppressed Indigenous people and their cultural and knowledge systems. Today a monument exists on the site commemorating his arrival. You might consider, scale, materials and techniques, perceptual effects. Early life [ edit] Possession Island 1992. It is at once a name revealed and something like the refusal of a name. Celebrations continued throughout the year and gave renewed focus to traditional images and stories of the nations settlement history. Explore. This education resource accompanies the retrospective exhibition Gordon Bennett (2008) which showcased 85 works by this internationally acclaimed Australian artist. Once again, the arena of self- portraiture becomes a vehicle to take over and challenge stereotypes. 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. Pollock was influenced by Navaho sand paintings, which were created on the ground. Inspired by African and Iberian art, he also contributed to the rise of Surrealism and Expressionism. In Malevichs work the black square is seen as having a strong and even spiritual presence. Research the representation of three dimensional space in selected artforms of several different cultures (ie. 148339 AK Gordon-Bennett-Rennen 1904 Cup Motorsport Usingen Weilburg Limburg. What is your personal interpretation of the abstract paintings? Gordon Bennett, Possession Island (Abstraction), 1991. Ontological questions as to what essentially is architecture, painting, sculpture, drawing, and print elicited numerous answers in the early modern period, due in part to experimentation and development in technical, formal, and discursive practices during the Middle Ages. 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. Such accolades and critical recognition are keenly sought by many artists. Possession Island 1991 was recently purchased by the Historic Houses Trust of NSW. The word DISPERSE was used by the colonisers to represent the killing of Aboriginal people. L120238 Gordon Bennett. The first panel of Bennetts triptych, Requiem, depicts Trugannini (c. 1812 1876), a Palawa woman from Tasmania. A gush of blood red paint shoots into the sky from his body. Gordon Bennett is an Australian artist of Aboriginal descent. However Bennetts illusionistic representation of the rugged terrain and billowing clouds reflect a style of painting traditionally associated with European Romantic art. They act as deep welts created when tissue scars. Why? These images are fused and overlapped in a dynamic composition underpinned by Mondrian-style grids. He lived and worked in Brisbane. Discuss with reference to the same works. cat. The grid, with its characteristic ordered mathematical structure, appears in a range of Bennetts artworks in a variety of forms. 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. These sources included social studies texts. The persistence of language references the way language controls and defines how we understand ourselves and our world. I had never thought to question those narratives and I certainly had never been taught at school to question them only to believe them. Purchased with funds from the Foundation for the Historic Houses Trust, Museum of Sydney Appeal, 2007. Image credit: Gordon Bennett - Possession Island (1991). Gordon Bennett, The manifest toe, p. 27, Identities come from somewhere, have histories, and like everything which is historical, they undergo constant transformation. Appropriation was a tool that enabled him to open up and re-define stereotypes and bias. Sell with Artsy Artist Series Portraits of Artists and Sculptors 113 available Purchased with funds from the Foundation for the Historic Houses Trust, Museum of Sydney Appeal, 2007. Australia for His Majesty King George III. Bennetts distinctive visual language repositions the subject of the work, claiming the Aboriginal perspective as central to the historical moment of the original painting. In Notes to Basquiat (Jackson Pollock and his other) 2001, Bennett confronts these issues within a global context. Western art has a long tradition of creating an illusion of three- dimensional space on a flat surface. In Possession Island, 1991, Bennett meticulously photocopies and enlarges Calverts image so that it can be projected, cropped and copied onto the canvas. This allowed him to utilise professional capture, editing and special effects software, to expand his art practice to include video and performance work. This is evident in many of his works, including Outsider. He depicts how pain transcends place and event to encompass a global consciousness. At the heart of all human life is a concept of self. When autocomplete results are available use up and down arrows to review and enter to select. He used weapons or gum tree branches as props, to construct an image that reflected European ideas of Aboriginal types. The linear diagram that frames the kneeling figure of Bennetts mother in the central panel of Triptych: Requiem, Of grandeur, Empire, and the diagrams in the lower sections of the two side panels, are typical of illustrations that explain the principles of linear perspective. Jenna Gribbon, Silver Tongue, 2019, Price ranges of small prints by Pablo Picasso. Lichtenstein 19231987). Bennett's 'unfinished business' was to encourage a great sensitivity and action in terms of these conditions," said Ms Stanhope. The graphic detail in these images, including mutilated, tortured bodies, continue to confront viewers today with the realities of human behaviour and suffering in war. However, in each image the grid effectively highlights the controlled order and structure of knowledge systems and learning in Western culture, and how these frame and influence perception and understanding of self, history and culture. The reality is, however, that I have never really had much choice; and I have been faced with my work not entering some collections on the grounds of it being not Aboriginal enough, to being asked to sell my work through stalls at cultural festivalsGordon Bennett 2. 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. * *Collection: Museum of Sydney on the site of the first Government House, Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales. Bennett adopted this alter ego to liberate himself from the preconceptions that were often associated with his Aboriginal heritage and his identity and reputation as the artist Gordon Bennett. Gordon Bennett (1955- 2014) was born in Monto, Queensland. The Spanish artist Francisco Goya (1746-1828) used the power of the grotesque in the Disasters of war series, which depicts some of the atrocities that took place in Spain during the War of Independence (1814-18). The title of the work itself is unsettling. Bennett was acutely aware that his own success paralleled the growing contemporary interest in Indigenous art and culture. I am purposely not defining him only as Aboriginal because he himself does not want to be defined only as such. He gave several sponsorships in these fields, notably the Isle of Man Bennett Trophy races of 1900 to 1905 (subsequently a trials course on the island was named after him). John Citizen lets me take my Australian citizenship and cultural upbringing back from the netherworld of the imagined Other. Bennetts art practice was interdisciplinary and encompasses painting, photography, printmaking, video, performance and installation. The works I have produced are notes, nothing more, to you and your work Gordon Bennett 1. It is also a direct reference to biblical stories in the Hebrew Scriptures. The early 'Possession Island' (Abstraction))' 1991 was one choice. Identify other artists who have used dots in their work (ie. Purchased with funds from the Foundation for the Historic Houses Trust, Museum of Sydney Appeal, 2007 The artist Gordon Bennett led a reclusive life. In the past Quadroon, was a socially acceptable term used to label Indigenous people as a way of establishing genetic heredity. Art can encourage people to rethink personal beliefs and positions. How ideas might be encountered from different places and events interest him. Oil and synthetic polymer paint on canvas Two parts: 162 x 260cm (overall . Possession Island (Appendix 1), 1991 and Notes to Basquiat (Jackson Pollock and his Other) (Appendix 2), 2001, will be discussed in relation to Henri's statement. Pinterest. However the hand in the opposite panel controls and threatens the Aboriginal figure represented as a jack- in- the- box. Since his first major solo exhibition in 1989 his work has been at the forefront of contemporary Australian art and has been recognised internationally for its innovative and critical engagement with ideas and issues of ongoing relevance to contemporary culture. James Gordon Bennett was born on a farm near Enzie, around three miles from Buckie, in 1795 but chose to follow a friend to North America when aged 24 with just 5 in his pocket. The central image is a reworking of an earlier painting completed at art college, The persistence of language, 1987, painted in the style of Basquiat. Gordon Bennett, The Manifest Toe, in Ian McLean & Gordon Bennett, The Art of Gordon Bennett, Craftsman House/ G + G Arts International, Sydney, 1996, pp.962.Kelly Gellatly et.al., Gordon Bennett: A Survey, exhibition catalogue, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne 2007. While his work was increasingly exhibited within a national and international context, the combination of his position (or as Bennett would argue label) as an (urban) Aboriginal artist, and the subject matter of his work, seemed to ensure inclusion within certain curatorial and critical frameworks, and largely determine interpretation and reception. 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. Theosophy means god wisdom, the belief that everything living or dead was put together from basic blocks that lead towards consciousness. But, in the late 1990s, some residents . The other was 'Number . Gordon Bennett, born on 16 April 1887 at Balwyn, Melbourne, was Australia's most controversial Second World War commander. Both artists have an affinity with Jazz, Rap and Hip Hop music. Gordon Bennett 1, Bennetts Aboriginal heritage came through his mother. His work is layered and complex and often incorporates images, styles or references drawn from sources such as social history text books, western art history and Indigenous art. Discuss with reference to a selection of at least three works, clearly identifying stylistic shifts, and evidence of conceptual unity. In this work Bennett directly references historical British sources, namely Samuel Calverts (18281913) colour etching Captain Cook Taking Possession of the Australian Continent on Behalf of the British Crown AD 1770 c.185364 (National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne), which is itself a copy of John Alexander Gilfillans (17931864) earlier, now lost, painting of the same title. Gordon Bennett uses self- portraits to question stereotypes and labelling. Nov 26, 2012 - The paintings of Gordon Bennett are loaded with graphic detail. Gordon Bennett, The Manifestoe, Ian McLean & Gordon Bennett. Gordon Bennett Possession Island (Abstraction) 1991 oil and acrylic on canvas 182 x 182cm Collection: Museum of Contemporary Art Australia and Tate, purchased jointly with funds provided by the Qantas Foundation, 2016 The Estate of Gordon Bennett From a distance the figure resembles a sculpture of a heroic Classical figure. 4 While artists often have limited control over how their work is exhibited after it has been sold, Bennett also refused to exhibit his work in Aboriginal art exhibitions, preferring: to be conceived as a contemporary artist who just happens to be indigenous and whose work encompasses an investigation of aboriginality and the construction of identity within a broad range of complex and interconnected issues.