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COLIN LANCELEY: EARTHLY DELIGHTS

Colin Lanceley: Earthly Delights installation view. Photo: Tim Connolly

Colin Lanceley (2010) Photo: Paul Green

COLIN LANCELEY: EARTHLY DELIGHTS

Curated by Sioux Garside, this new major exhibition celebrates Colin Lanceley (1938-2015), a Modernist trailblazer who believed in celebrating the joyous qualities of life in his vibrant, three-dimensional art.

After studying at NAS in the 1950s, which he described as “the opening of my life”, he returned to teach there from the 1980s, then in the 1990s helped write a new chapter for the School as an independent tertiary institution offering visual art degrees, after decades of being attached to NSW’s technical education sector. In the 1960s and 70s, Colin was a vigorous and adventurous spirit at a time when contemporary Australian art was discovering new forms and inspiration, as well as acknowledging the ancient country’s unique and powerful Indigenous art. Born in New Zealand in 1938 and growing up on Sydney’s north shore, a life creating art was not on the cards for young Colin, but with the encouragement of key teachers he found his way to the place he belonged, and in turn helped countless others setting off on their own artistic path. Supported by his wife Kay, this exhibition is a celebration of Colin’s life and work, confirming his creative legacy in the same year the National Art School celebrates 100 years since moving to the Darlinghurst Gaol site.

EXHIBITION DATES:

Friday 24 June – Saturday 13 August 2022NAS GalleryMonday to Saturday, 11am–5pm

Publication Supporter:

With additional support from the Lanceley Exhibition Supporters Group.

Diverse Delights

This panel discussion will offer recollections and insights into the life and work of Colin Lanceley AO from a range of perspectives. Speakers include Felix Lanceley, the artist’s son, Sioux Garside, curator of the Earthly Delights exhibition, Stuart Purves, Director, Australian Galleries who has represented the artist since the 1980s, and Louise Olsen, artist and co-founder of Dinosaur Designs who is a former student of Colin Lanceley at NAS. The discussion will be chaired by Julian Beaumont OAM, who sat with Lanceley on the Advisory Board of NAS during a formative period in the 1990s.

Image: Colin Lanceley, Xanadu 1969, synthetic polymer paint, assemblage and ink on shaped canvas, 106.5 x 124.5 x 24 cm. Macquarie University Art Collection. © Colin Lanceley estate / Copyright Agency. Photo: Effy Alexakis, Photowrite.

DATE HELD: 

Saturday 6 August, 3pmNAS Gallery

 

Panelists

JULIAN BEAMONT OAM

Following a career in investment banking, Julian Beaumont was appointed in 1996 as a founding member of the National Art School Advisory Board with . He also represented NSW on the board of Artbank and of several other arts organisations. He has been involved in the selection and judging of several sculpture events, including the National Sculpture Prize at the NGA, Sculpture Inside at Bondi and ArtsCape in Byron Bay. Julian Beaumont also oversaw the creation and development of the Macquarie Group Collection and contributed to the building of the Australian Club Collection and has written books about both. He has long been a supporter of Australian art and artists, promoting them here and overseas.

SIOUX GARSIDE

Sioux Garside is the curator of Colin Lanceley: Earthly Delights. She has enjoyed a 35-year professional life working in the Australian visual arts sector as a gallery director, curator, educator and writer. She holds a Master of Arts degree from the City University of New York and worked in the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She was deputy director of Newcastle Art Gallery, inaugural director of Campbelltown City Art Gallery and senior curator of the art collection at the University of Sydney. Since 2006 Sioux Garside has worked as a curatorial advisor in the private sector. Recent publications include Elisabeth Cummings, Ildiko Kovacs and Suzanne Archer and she is currently working on a book for the John Peart Estate.

Felix Lanceley

Felix is Colin’s youngest son, born to the artist and wife Kay during their time away living in London in the 60s and 70s. Having grown up immersed in Lanceley’s creative process and the world surrounding it, the younger Lanceley has a unique perspective of the artist’s work and its creation. Felix Lanceley inherited his father’s interest in travel and exploring the different cultures of the World. He has spent the last 25 years studying and working at home and abroad, chiselling out a career in international education which has taken him to Asia, Europe and the Middle East. He is currently General Manager of UOW College, an Institute of Higher Education providing pathways to the University of Wollongong.

Louise Olsen

Artist  – Studio in Sydney, Australia. Creative Director, Designer & Co Founder of Dinosaur Designs. Louise grew up in the world of artists as the daughter of Valerie Olsen Strong and John Olsen. You could say that she was touched by the brush from the moment she was born. Her artworks and designs have travelled the globe and have been collected and exhibited in galleries and museums around the world. The combination of her own art practice alongside her work as a designer and Creative Director of Dinosaur Designs for 37 years, with stores based in New York & London, has given Louise a great creative adventure. 

Stuart Purves

Stuart Purves, director of Australian Galleries, continues to strengthen and diversify the thriving enterprise started in Melbourne in 1956 by his parents Anne and Tam. Since joining the business in 1966, Stuart has been privileged to promote a leading selection of modern and contemporary Australian artists. From the beginning, Australian Galleries developed a reputation for representing prominent Australian artists. As a passionate advocate of artists, Stuart’s role as director is to ensure the gallery remains vital and viable so the artists he represents survive and prosper. Stuart Purves’ personal dedication and enthusiasm to the promotion of the arts in Australia is indicative of his confidence in the important role visual art plays in the national and international psyche. With over fifty years active involvement, he continues to be passionate about art and his commitment to the artists he represents.

‘Colin Lanceley: Earthly Delights’ Exhibition Catalogue

Earthly delights surveys the significant creative achievements of Colin Lanceley (1938-2015) over five decades from the 1960s to 2012. This exhibition traces the evolution of his work from the early, raw collages made as a member of the Imitation Realists, an artist collaborative group formed at NAS, to his assembled sculptures of the mid-1960s and his subsequent incorporation of hand-carved assemblage into his painted surfaces over ensuing decades.

Colin Lanceley’s art evolved from his curiosity and the pleasure he gained from art, poetry, classical music, literature, nature and the world around him. He worked endlessly to give expression to his rich store of memories and sensory encounters, creating ingenious interplays of colour, texture and sculptural form as a way of visualising the boundlessness and vitality of experience. In his own words, Lanceley wanted to ”make art that addressed the street, which more satisfactorily addressed our experience of being alive”.

PUBLICATION DETAILS

Title: Colin Lanceley: Earthly Delights 
Author: National Art School
Publisher: National Art School
ISBN: 978-0-6451306-2-1
Publication Date: June 2022
Language: English
Binding: Hardcover
Dimensions: 25 x 27.2 x 2 cm
Shipping Weight: 1kg

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The National Art School is proud to present The Grad Show, 6 – 15 December 2024, our major end-of-year exhibition showcasing the work of our 2024 Bachelor of Fine Art (BFA) graduates.
—
Celebrate the future of contemporary art at The Grad Show Opening Night, Thursday 5 December, 6–10pm.
—
RSVP for the Opening Night at the link in bio.

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Nov 21

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The National Art School is proud to present The Grad Show, 6 – 15 December 2024, our major end-of-year exhibition showcasing the work of our 2024 Bachelor of Fine Art (BFA) graduates. — Celebrate the future of contemporary art at The Grad Show Opening Night, Thursday 5 December, 6–10pm. — RSVP for the Opening Night at the link in bio.
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