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An image of Things on an iron tray on the floor by Grace Cossington Smith

Grace Cossington Smith

(Australia 1892–20 Dec 1984)

Title
Things on an iron tray on the floor
Other titles:
Things on an Iron Tray
Place of origin
Turramurra → Sydney → New South Wales → Australia
Year
(circa 1928)
Media category
Painting
Materials used
oil on plywood
Dimensions

54.0 x 69.5cm board; 65.1 x 80.7 x 3.8cm frame

Signature & date
Signed l.l. corner, black ink "G Cossington Smith". Not dated.
Credit
Purchased 1967
Accession number
OA9.1967
Copyright
© Estate of Grace Cossington Smith
Location
Not on display
Further information

The years from 1926 until the mid 1930s were the most important in Grace Cossington Smith’s artistic life. She progressed beyond her early art training with Dattilo-Rubbo, and realised her potential as a painter of colour and light, structure and rhythmic pattern. As Thea Proctor wrote, Cossington Smith’s ‘lovely and individual colour sense’ was achieved with paint ‘applied once and not touched again … [with] a mat-dry surface, freshness and vitality’.

While this work represents domestic items in a still-life arrangement, the true subject of the painting is the interplay between colour, form and light. It presents radiating, concentric forms in luminous colour.

Bibliography (11)

'Grace Cossington Smith: looking bakc at a life of colour and light' by Deborah Hart, pg. 28-31., Look Nov 2005, Nov 2005, 29 (colour illus.).

'Amazing Grace: Thoughts inspired by the Grace Cossington Smith exhibition at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra' by Virginia Spate, pg. 22-30., Art Monthly Australia Aug 2005, Aug 2005, 26.

Deborah Hart (South Africa; United Kingdom; Australia, b.1959) (Editor), Grace Cossington Smith, Canberra, 2005, 32, 35, 36 (colour illus.), 90.

Rosemary Lloyd (United States of America, active 2005) (Author), Shimmering in a transformed light: writing the still life, Ithaca, 2005, 30, 31 (illus.), 126. figure no. 4

Margaret Olley (Australia, b.1923, d.2011) (Author), Barry Humphries (Australia, b.1934) (Author), Deborah Hart (South Africa; United Kingdom; Australia, b.1959) (Director), Christine France (Australia) (Co-ordinator), Favourites: Margaret Olley and Barry Humphries choose from public and private collections, Sydney, 2000. Catalogue entry appears in inserted list to printed catalogue

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, 47 (colour illus.).

Bruce James (Australia) (Author), Grace Cossington Smith, Sydney, 1990, 72 (illus.), 75, 77. figure no. 32

'Grace Cossington Smith' by Daniel Thomas, pg. 510-521., Art Gallery of New South Wales Quarterly Jan 1970, Jan 1970, 505 (cover illus.), 506, 519.

'Grace Cossington Smith' by Daniel Thomas., Art and Australia Mar 1967, Mar 1967, 305, 308 (illus.).

1967 Acquisitions 1967, 1967, 21. cat.no. 26

Art in Australia [series 3, no. 26] 1928, 1928, (illus.). plate no. 15; 'The Art of the Year' issue

Exhibition history (9)

Grace Cossington Smith (1928), Grosvenor Gallery, 23 Jul 1928–04 Aug 1928.

Eighteenth annual exhibition of the Contemporary Group (1943), Blaxland Gallery, 06 Jul 1943–16 Jul 1943.

Acquisitions 1967, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 06 Mar 1968–01 Apr 1968.

Favourites: Margaret Olley and Barry Humphries choose from Australian collections (2000), S.H. Ervin Gallery, 15 Jan 2000–27 Feb 2000.

Australian icons: twenty artists from the collection, Art Gallery of New South Wales, 04 Aug 2000–03 Dec 2000.

Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), National Gallery of Australia, 04 Mar 2005–13 Jun 2005.

Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), Art Gallery of South Australia, 29 Jul 2005–09 Oct 2005.

Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), Art Gallery of New South Wales, 29 Oct 2005–15 Jan 2006.

Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), Queensland Art Gallery, 11 Feb 2006–30 Apr 2006.