By Karina Devine
Regional Art Galleries are often defined by their collections. The Toowoomba Regional Art Gallery, for example, has a magnificent collection of contemporary wearables and Artspace Mackay’s collection features one of the biggest holdings of artists’ books in Australia outside of the capital cities. Other regional galleries are known officially as “non-collecting” galleries and Warwick Art Gallery falls into this category. We do, however, have a small but noteworthy collection of artworks that have quite eclectic origins but represent significant names in contemporary Australian painting. Artworks acquired by and donated to the former Rosenthal, Glengallan, Allora and Warwick Shire Councils make up around half of the collection that Warwick Art Gallery oversees. The other half of the collection was created through acquisitions from the Warwick Art Prize which was held annually from 1996 to 2009. These works, plus a small number of recent donations, are now part of the asset known as the Southern Downs Regional Council collection which also includes the magnificent large collection housed in the Stanthorpe Regional Art Gallery.
At present the Warwick collection mostly hangs throughout the Southern Downs Regional Council Administration building located on Fitzroy Street but for the first time in two decades the entire collection will be on public display at Warwick Art Gallery from the 7th of October to the 13th of November 2021.
Without a doubt the most popular work in the collection is Kenneth MacQueen’s Storm over the Downs. This beautiful watercolour is indicative of the artist’s distinctive style. Macqueen was also a farmer and his works reflect the innate bond with the land that farmers have. The country side represented will look familiar to locals as his farm was located near Millmerran on the Darling Downs, where he settled in 1922.
Questions for my Analyst by James Guppy was announced the winner of the Warwick Art Prize in 2006. The judge was Bruce Heiser who at the time ran the Bruce Heiser Gallery in Brisbane. He commented on the “gentle absurbism” of James Guppy’s work.
“The viewers are confronted by an image which is really rather incongruous. Who on earth could have placed these objects in the landscape and why? Is there a particular significance in the relationship between the objects? The strength and virility of the hammer opposing the more feminine shape and delicacy of the porcelain cup, but both objects show imperfections. Both have been attacked by objects that usually share a natural affinity with them. Could the answer to this riddle be in part hidden in the title itself? Bruce Heiser 2006
Some of the works in the collection have an incredible significance to individuals for the memories they provoke. Tom Garrett’s Still Life Floral was presented to Shire of Warwick by the Quota Club of Warwick in memory of club member Amy Brown, who died in 1963. In 2021 Amy’s daughter Judith Anderson contacted Warwick Art Gallery to see if the painting was still in the collection, which it was, and she subsequently visited Warwick to see it.
“My mother, Amy Brown, loved flowers. In fact she often said she would have liked to be a florist,” said Judith, “ I have often wondered if she shared this unrealised dream with her friends in the Quota Club of Warwick because, a year after she died, aged 41, the club donated this painting in her memory. I was thrilled when the Director of the Warwick Art Gallery told me that it still had a valued place in the collection, and was quite overwhelmed to see it for the first time in almost 60 years.”
The majority of works in the collection have drawn inspiration from the Australian Landscape. Some have captured majestic vistas while others delve more into the “sense” of the landscape like Yvonne Mills-Stanley’s Following Grass VII which was the winner of the Warwick Art Prize in 2004, selected by Toowoomba academic and arts writer Sandy Pottinger.
“This painting has an obsessive intensity with a concentrated rhythmic curve of blonde grasses suggesting a mysterious and protected haven, or perhaps even alien intervention! The variations of tone are linear layers meticulously applied; they glow and sparkle from a chocolate brown ground. The shimmering surface is lively and seems to vibrate, but what adds a magical and tantalising extra quality are the flashes of blue – like light from an opal, they lift the subtle tones into song.” Sandy Pottinger 2004
The judges’ comments and written records tell a deeper story about each work in the collection and will be part of the exhibition labels for visitors to get a more complete story. Sadly some details as to the history of the purchase/bequest of many of the early acquisitions are limited. Any information the public might be able to provide on the works/artists is welcomed.
Collection: Artworks from the former Rosenthal, Glengallan, Allora and Warwick Shire Councils and the Warwick Art Prize 1996 – 2009 will be on display 7 October to 13 November. It will also be the feature exhibition at Warwick Art Gallery on the weekend of the Condamine Country Art and Open Studio Trail on 6-7 November.
