Gary Catalano

I don’t quite know what to make of J.G. Steele’s dull, parochial catalogue of sketches and watercolours by Conrad Martens. The ‘frontier travels’ of one of our better colonial artists should, you expect, make interesting copy – especially when the artist in question happened to be prolific and the area of his travels the sparsely settled pastoral area of what is now South-eastern Queensl ... (read more)

Because of its gloomy appearance the building is like a defeated army, and the gloom is so heavy it makes handling difficult and postage quite out of the question. Still, if you wish to transfer its impression to someone don’t despair at the apparent impossibility of it; there are some things you can do, and it’s always better to feel like a winner than be dragged down by your enemies. I say t ... (read more)

‘To paint’, Ian Fairweather once observed, ‘one must be alone.’ True enough, you think, though hardly deserving of quotation. Down the years all kinds of artists have made the same observation, yet not many of them have been as consistently forthright when essaying the value and aesthetic nature of their lonely activity. Fairweather was an exception. ‘I paint for myself,’ he went on to ... (read more)