S.H. Ervin Gallery

Private View: Wendy Sharpe in conversation with Elizabeth Fortescue

WEDNESDAY 24 JULY 5.30-5.30PM

Join us for an exclusive after-hours viewing of the Salon des Refusés with welcome drinks and canapes and then sit back and enjoy the exhibiting artist Wendy Sharpe in conversation with arts writer Elisabeth Fortescue for a discussion of her work and what inspires this fascinating artist.

Wendy's new book, Many Lives, published by Wakefield Press will also be available for purchase and Wendy will be signing books on the evening.

COST: $45 (includes exhibition viewing, welcome drink and canapes)

BOOKINGS - https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/special-exhibition-event-with-wendy-sharpe-elizabeth-fortescue-tickets-929455094207

image: WENDY SHARPE Self-Portrait with Improbable Beings oil on canvas 76 x 61 cm

'The judges might also have spared a thought for Paul Miller’s I Am Still (Self-Portrait), which celebrates his recovery from a serious operation. The work loses nothing in comparison with most of the paintings that actually got hung, and has an affirmative aspect that might speak to anyone who has come through their own brush with illness or mortality.'
John McDonald in the Sydney Morning Herald 29 June 2024

Gallery open: Tuesday-Sunday 11am-5pm
Cafe: 9258 0175 bookings essential

https://www.smh.com.au/culture/art-and-design/do-we-care-about-the-archibald-prize-too-much-20240624-p5jobm.html

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Christopher McVinish's work, The silent street, is capturing attention in the Salon des Refuses.

'In my ‘landscape of the suburbs’ one senses a deep feeling of isolation. Although there is a light on in one of the windows there is a palpable lack of human presence. It’s as if something has happened or is about to happen. On the surface the scene appears quiet, silent even, but beneath the surface there is tension, perhaps even a feeling of déjà-vu.'

Christopher will be speaking about his work in the Gallery on Sunday 21 July at 3pm.

'Of the Salon works, Noel Thurgate’s Portrait of Ann Thomson is one of the standouts. Although he is a consummately skilful draftsman, when attempting a major painting Thurgate feels the need to try a few tricksy things, if only to provide a ‘contemporary’ edge. In this picture, an artfully carved and textured panel doesn’t detract from the strength of the portrait, which captures Thomson’s character and confidence, as a painter who has just turned 90 but is still going strong.'
John McDonald in the Sydney Morning Herald 29 June 2024

Gallery open: Tuesday-Sunday 11am-5pm, Cafe bookings recommended 9258 0175

''There’s another case to be made for Sharon Billinge’s tiny portrait of her friend, Celeste Chandler, who died last year. Matters of life and death provide better reasons for portraiture than mere flattery."
John McDonald writing for The Sydney Morning Herald 29 June 2024

Come see this and other great works in the 2024 Salon des Refuses.
We're open Tuesday-Sunday 11am-5pm. Bookings for the cafe advised 92580175

https://www.smh.com.au/culture/art-and-design/do-we-care-about-the-archibald-prize-too-much-20240624-p5jobm.html

"Another painting that deserves a serious look is Evan Salmon’s Studio interior, reflection (self-portrait). As self-portraits go it’s almost aggressively modest. Salmon has painted a tiny version of his own face, captured in a mirror, within a detailed interior view of the studio. Even in reflection, the face is turned to one side, as if Salmon would prefer not to be noticed, asking us to consider the art, not the artist.

John McDonald writing in the Sydney Morning Herald 29 June 2024

https://www.smh.com.au/culture/art-and-design/do-we-care-about-the-archibald-prize-too-much-20240624-p5jobm.html

'The best reason the Archibald judges might have had for omitting Joanna Braithwaite’s tongue-in-cheek Memory Lane (self-portrait), which shows the artist driving along with a car full of lizards, is once again that it is simply too large. It would, however, have been a showstopper alongside so many of the dull, poorly executed works they favoured.”

John McDonald writing in The Sydney Morning Herald 29 June 2024

Open: Tuesday-Sunday 11am-5pm Cafe: 9258 0175 bookings essential
Salon des Refuses on view until 25 August.

https://www.smh.com.au/culture/art-and-design/do-we-care-about-the-archibald-prize-too-much-20240624-p5jobm.html

Private View: Wendy Sharpe in conversation with Elizabeth Fortescue
WEDNESDAY 24 JULY 5.30-7.30PM

Join us for an exclusive after-hours viewing of the Salon des Refusés with welcome drinks and canapes and then sit back and enjoy the exhibiting artist Wendy Sharpe in conversation with arts writer Elisabeth Fortescue for a discussion of her work and what inspires this fascinating artist.

Wendy’s new book, Many Lives, published by Wakefield Press will also be available for purchase and Wendy will be signing books on the evening.

COST: $45 (includes exhibition viewing, welcome drink and canapes)

BOOKINGS - https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/special-exhibition-event-with-wendy-sharpe-elizabeth-fortescue-tickets-929455094207

Mantua Nangala's ''elegant, complex painting'' evokes the sand dunes and country around the sacred women’s site of Marrapinti near Kiwirrrkurra in WA.

Mantua began painting for in 1988, after watching her father and husband paint.

The lines in this painting represent the sandhills (tali) at the site of Marrapinti, west of the Po***ck Hills in Western Australia. A large group of ancestral women camped at this rockhole before continuing their travels further east, passing through Wala Wala, Kiwirrkura and Ngaminya.

Read more about the works in the Salon in the Spectrum this weekend. https://www.smh.com.au/culture/art-and-design/do-we-care-about-the-archibald-prize-too-much-20240624-p5jobm.html

Exhibition on view until 25 August. Gallery open Tuesday-Sunday 11am-5pm.

Make sure that you read the review of the 2024 Salon des Refuses by John McDonald in today's Sydney Morning Herald.

'The other artist who can count herself unlucky is Mary Tonkin, whose large, four-panelled painting, A scream, Kalorama, shows a dark, explosive mass of roots where tall trees have been wrenched out of the ground. It’s an intimate view of the forest with overtones of expressionist agony, and I’ve never seen anything quite like it. .... Tonkin is a dedicated landscapist who finds almost all her subject matter in a small corner of the Dandenongs.

https://www.smh.com.au/culture/art-and-design/do-we-care-about-the-archibald-prize-too-much-20240624-p5jobm.html
image: MARY TONKIN A scream, Kalorama oil on linen, 214 x 366 cm

Sign up to our e-ART newsletter and enjoy exclusive subscriber giveaways for movie passes and new release books.

Join before 1 July and you can enter the draw for in-season passes to the great new comedy The Fabulous Four, thanks to Transmission Films.

https://www.shervingallery.com.au/subscribe-to-our-e-art-newsletter/

In 1995 Wendy Sharpe won the Portia Geach Memorial Award with the painting, ‘Self portrait with students, after Adelaide Labille-Guiard’(pictured).

We are trying to locate it for a forthcoming exhibition however its current whereabouts are not known.

Please contact us if you can help - [email protected]

On Sunday 23 June at 3pm join artists John R. Walker, Jacqui Driver and Ava McClure to discuss their works in the Wynne Prize selection of the Salon des Refusés exhibition.

It is with much sadness we mark the death of much-loved artist Guy Warren AM in Sydney earlier this morning at the age of 103.

Guy was rarely without a twinkle in his eye, and so enjoyed talking about painting and what he was going to do next.

Our condolences to his son Parl & daughter Joanna, extended family and many, many friends.

Farewell dear Guy.

Sinead Davies painting, Heather Ewart with gum-nuts, is one of the selections in this year’s Salon des Refusés: the ‘alternative’ Archibald and Wynne Prize selection.

‘Heather Ewart’s portrait was inspired by her presentation of the ABC’s Back Road TV series.
I loved getting to know Regional Australia and the locals through her travels and interviews.

I visited Heather in her home for the portrait research and found her to be one of those rare humans: who is forever young! The physical element of using paint and paintbrushes to portray such a complex, highly intelligent individual is daunting, failure is always close by. Nevertheless I tried.’

ABC News ABC Arts

The Salon des Refusés exhibition in the news today. Thanks to arts editor Nick Galvin for the story of our ‘alternative’ selection.

The ‘reject’ show that artists love to be seen in Making it into the Salon des Refusés is no mean feat for Archibald and Wynne Prize entrants.

Congratulations to the winners of the 2024 Archibald, Wynne & Sulman Prizes!

We're ready to open the doors of the Salon des Refusés today so come along and enjoy the 'alternative' selection from the Archibald & Wynne Prizes. Open 11am-5pm, Tuesday-Sunday.

pictured from left: Mantua Nangala, Katjarra Butler and Charles Cooper

The list of artists in the Salon des Refusés: the ‘alternative’ Archibald & Wynne Prize selection is now up on our website. See who made the cut this year!

Exhibition starts Saturday 8 June at 11am and continues until Sunday 25 August at 5pm.

Pictured from left: Marie Mansfield’s portrait of Caroline Zilinsky; Heather Miller’s self-portrait and Tony Costa’s Professor Veena Sahajwalla UNSW

Happy 90th Birthday to the marvellous Elizabeth Cummings. Sending our very best wishes on this extra special day.

It’s the final weekend to catch Sally Robinson’s dazzling survey exhibition so hurry. John McDonald’s review of the exhibition is in today’s The Sydney Morning Herald in Spectrum.

The wonderful Wendy Sharpe in her re-created studio at the Art Gallery of New South Wales alongside her exhibition, Spellbound, which is on view until 11 August.

John McDonald’s review of the Sally Robinson survey exhibition is now online. Hurry and catch it before it closes Sunday 2 June!

Artist’s iconic images still feel as fresh as the day they were made Once seen, Sally Robinson’s works are never forgotten.

Join exhibiting artist Sally Robinson in the Gallery on Sunday 26 May at 3pm for a talk about the work in her survey exhibition. Free with Gallery admission.

"Robinson’s prints feel as fresh as the day they were made, as visitors to her 50-year survey at the S.H. Ervin Gallery will discover.....Robinson has completed more than 50 portraits in a little over 20 years, in a highly distinctive style. Although she always aims for a realistic likeness, the surfaces of each work are treated in more experimental fashion, with colour applied in tiny dabs or dashes, like a variation on the pointillisme of Seurat and Signac...There’s no doubt Robinson is a more accomplished artist at this late stage of her career, but those vivid works of the 1970s and 80s have an iconic dimension that once seen, is never forgotten.''

John McDonald writing for The Sydney Morning Herald https://www.johnmcdonald.net.au/2024/sally-robinson/?utm_source=Website+Subscriptions&utm_campaign=56e874c5c6-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_04_18_COPY_274&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_b7a71c8b42-56e874c5c6-220716789

image: Sally Robinson Road to Wanaaring 1977

The official portrait of King Charles has been revealed to polarising views of its merit. Hypothetically, do you think it would make the cut for the Archibald Prize?

https://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/king-charles-first-portrait-since-coronation-reveals-deep-humanity-20240515-p5jdoi.html

Do you think that a sitter should be allowed to determine whether their portrait is submitted to an award or exhibition?

In this case it's not clear if the subject actually sat for the artist, but it poses an interesting conundrum in the lead up to portrait award season.

The portrait Gina Rinehart doesn’t want you to see Australia’s richest person wants the gallery to remove the artwork from an exhibition by Indigenous artist Vincent Namatjira.