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Details
- Place where the work was made
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Robertson
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New South Wales
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Australia
- Date
- 2012
- Media category
- Painting
- Materials used
- oil on linen
- Dimensions
- 120.5 x 130.0 cm each panel; 241.0 x 520.0 cm overall
- Signature & date
Not signed. Not dated.
- Credit
- Purchased with funds provided by the Patrick White Bequest 2012
- Location
- Not on display
- Accession number
- 360.2012.a-h
- Copyright
- © Ben Quilty
- Artist information
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Ben Quilty
Works in the collection
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About
'Fairy Bower Rorschach' continues Ben Quilty's practice of oil painted Rorschach works where an original painted image is both damaged and duplicated by pressing one panel at a time onto another similar sized panel while the paint is still wet. Quilty refers to the Swiss psychoanalyst Hermann Rorschach's ink blot tests - widely seen as pioneering contemporary mental illness therapy and medication at the beginning of the 20th century.
The damaged and mirrored image is of a waterfall at Bundanoon in the Southern Highlands of New South Wales near where Quilty lives and works. Fairy Bower Falls is an idyllic and spectacular destination for tourists and locals. Photographs from the mid 19th century depict the full colonial splendour of women with parasols and men in top hats at the foot of the falls.
Fairy Bower Falls is also reputedly the site of a massacre of scores of Aboriginal people in the early 19th century. Although there are no written records there has been a strong oral history of such an event handed down amongst locals.
By Rorschaching this image of such a precarious site Quilty asks the viewer to reconsider their conception of this landscape as a place of idyllic beauty. The duplication and damage of the image echoes the disturbing and violent history this site may have witnessed. This work continues Quilty's exploration of Australian identity and history.
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Exhibition history
Shown in 8 exhibitions
Ben Quilty: the Fiji wedding, Tolarno Galleries, Melbourne, 20 Apr 2013–01 Jun 2013
Trigger-happy: Ben Quilty's brave new world, Drill Hall Gallery, Australian National University, Canberra, 08 Nov 2013–15 Dec 2013
(Ben QuiltyPrudential Asian Eye Award), Saatchi Gallery, London, 01 Jul 2014–01 Aug 2014
Ben Quilty, Bendigo Art Gallery, Victoria, 11 Dec 2014–01 Mar 2015
When silence falls, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 19 Dec 2015–29 May 2016
Quilty, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 02 Mar 2019–02 Jun 2019
Quilty, Queensland Art Gallery, South Brisbane, 29 Jun 2019–13 Oct 2019
Quilty, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 09 Nov 2019–02 Feb 2020
Ben Quilty; Landscape, Cairns Art Gallery, Cairns, 12 Dec 2020–13 Mar 2021
Making Worlds, Art Gallery of New South Wales, North Building, Sydney, 03 Dec 2022–2023
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Bibliography
Referenced in 5 publications
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Andrew Denton, Ben Quilty: the Fiji wedding, 'Heartquake: embedded with Quilty', n.pag., Melbourne, 2013, n.pag. (colour illus.), n.pag.. viewed 27.06.2013, http://archive.tolarnogalleries.com/archive/Ben%20Quilty%20The%20Fiji%20Wedding%202013/
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Cara Pinchbeck, Look, 'When silence falls', pg. 24-26, Sydney, Dec 2015-Jan 2016, 24, 26 (colour illus.).
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Lisa Slade, Ben Quilty: Prudential Eye Awards Contemporary Asian Art, 'Ben Quilty', pg. 9-11, United Kingdom, 2014, 9, 16-17 (colour illus.), 32.
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Lisa Slade, Ben Quilty, 'The colour of Quilty', pg. 27-37, Docklands, 2019, 33, 143, 144-45 (colour illus.), 345.
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Natalie Wilson and Anneke Jaspers, Foundation Newsletter #22, 'Curators' and coordinators' reports: Australian art', pg. 6-7, Sydney, Jun 2013, 7.
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