Albert Tucker
(Australia 29 Dec 1914–23 Oct 1999)
- Title
- Apocalyptic horse
- Year
- 1956
- Media category
- Painting
- Materials used
- oil on hardboard
- Dimensions
-
62.0 x 81.0cm board; 79.4 x 97.8 x 3.2cm frame
- Signature & date
- Signed and dated l.l. corner, black oil "Tucker 1956".
- Credit
- Purchased 1982
- Accession number
- 286.1982
- Copyright
- © Barbara Tucker
- Location
- 20th & 21st c Australian art
- Further information
Tucker’s paintings created outside Australia during the 1950s and 1960s reveal an affinity with the Italian painter Alberto Burri, whom he had met in Rome in 1953–54. Intrigued by the textural quality inherent in polyvinyl acetate (used by Burri to create his evocative built-up surfaces), Tucker adopted the flexible and leathery toughness of this new material into his work.
During his time in Rome in 1954 Tucker also met his friend Sidney Nolan, who had brought with him photographs of the 1952 Queensland drought. Images of desiccated animal carcasses strewn across a parched terrain left an enduring impression on Tucker. 'Apocalyptic horse' was painted in reaction to these images, and is one of several works which display Tucker’s conversion from oils to fast-drying acrylic paint, evoking the shape and texture of the Australian outback.
- Bibliography (8)
-
Geoffrey Smith (Author), Sidney Nolan: desert & drought, Melbourne, 2003, 127 (colour illus.). figure no. 3
'Extreme contradictory fascinating' by Janine Burke, pg. 29-30., Look Aug 2002, Aug 2002, 30 (colour illus.).
Lou Klepac (Australia; Croatia, b.1936) (Author), Barry Pearce (Australia) (Author), Bruce James (Australia) (Author), John McDonald (Australia, b.1961) (Author), Peter Pinson (Australia, b.1943) (Author), Gavin Fry (Author), Sasha Grishin AM (Australia) (Author), Deborah Hart (South Africa; United Kingdom; Australia, b.1959) (Author), Australian painters of the twentieth century, Roseville, 2000, 106 (colour illus.).
Barry Pearce (Australia) (Author), Australian art: in the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Domain, 2000, 164, 179 (colour illus.), 302.
James Mollison (Australia, b.1932) (Author), Jan Minchin (Author), Albert Tucker: a retrospective, Melbourne, 1990, 51 (colour illus.), 115.
Annabel Davie (Editor), Art Gallery of New South Wales Handbook, Domain, 1988, 32.
Deborah Edwards (Australia) (Author), Two centuries of Australian painting: a selection from the Art Gallery of New South Wales, New South Wales, 1986, 38 (colour illus.), 37. cat.no. 40
Edmund Capon (England; Australia, b.1940) (Editor), Jan Meek (Australia) (Editor), Portrait of a Gallery, Sydney, 1984, 82, 83 (colour illus.).
- Exhibition history (2)
-
Two centuries of Australian painting, a selection from the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Orange Regional Gallery, 19 Apr 1986–15 Jun 1986.
Albert Tucker: promised gifts from the Estate, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 17 Jan 2007–11 Mar 2007.
