In the brochure that accompanies this year’s Salon des Refusés at the S.H.Ervin Gallery, one reads that the show is “in the tradition of the renegade French Impressionists of the 1860s, who held a breakaway exhibition from the reactionary French Academy.” Leaving aside the fact that the term ‘Impressionism’ wasn’t used until the 1870s, this … More
Posted in: Australian Art, Sydney Morning Herald Column
April 21, 2012
Rather like its subject, Modern Woman is one of those exhibitions that must be approached with no fixed expectations, for it has the capacity to instill both disappointment and delight. Any event that includes names such as Degas, Bonnard, Renoir, Manet, Pissarro, Millet, Rodin, Vuillard and Toulouse-Lautrec, would seem to have ‘blockbuster’ written all over … More
Posted in: International Art, Sydney Morning Herald Column
April 14, 2012
There have been 24 previous Kaldor Public Art Projects in Sydney, but never anything so cool and oblique as Thomas Demand’s The Dailies 2012. The work is not installed in a gallery, but in the Commercial Travellers’ Association Club, in the MLC Centre, just off Martin Place. The unconventional venue is an essential part of … More
Posted in: Australian Art, International Art, Sydney Morning Herald Column
April 7, 2012
A new Museum of Contemporary Art has been a long time coming. This weekend the public can take a first look and see if the wait has been worthwhile. My own verdict, after an intensive preview, is that it is a qualified success. Some would argue we have been waiting ever since John Wardell Power’s … More
Posted in: Australian Art, International Art, Sydney Morning Herald Column
March 16, 2012
“Hurry, hurry, last days!” Margaret Olley used to say, when she felt the pinch of old age. Her final show, completed in fairy tale fashion on the day she died, reveals an artist who knew she did not have much time left. The paintings in the exhibition, The Inner Sanctum, hosted by Philip Bacon in … More
Posted in: Art Essays, Australian Art, Blog, General Art Essays
March 13, 2012
As half of the Sydney art world celebrated the launch of Art Month, and the other half clinked glasses at a valedictory show of Margaret Olley’s work, I was on Cottesloe Beach watching the sun set over the Indian Ocean. It was the eighth incarnation of Sculpture by the Sea in Western Australia, and I … More
Posted in: Art Essays, Australian Art, Blog, General Art Essays
January 21, 2012
As a man walked down the aisle towards his bride-to-be, the best man whispered to him: “You are making the biggest mistake of your life.” Within a few months those words had rung true. Is it too late to stop the Art Gallery of NSW making the same mistake? When Edmund Capon announced last August … More
Posted in: Blog
November 30, 2011
For 26 years Peter Crayford wrote the weekly film column for the Australian Financial Revew, an appointment he missed on only a handful of occasions. His consistency and the quality of his work become even more remarkable when one understands the circumstances of his life. When early on Sunday morning, Peter gave up his long, … More
Posted in: Blog, Film, General Essays, Other Writing
For over twenty years he has been one of Australia’s best-known art critics, writing a weekly column for the Sydney Morning Herald, and contributing to local and international publications. More
