Charles Meere

(Australia 1890–1961)

Title

Australian beach pattern

Other titles:

Beach Pattern

Place of origin

Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

Year

1940

Media

Painting

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

91.5 x 122.0cm stretcher; 108.0 x 138.8 x 5.5cm frame

Signature & date

Signed and dated l.r. corner, pencil "CHARLES MEERE 1940".

Credit

Purchased 1965

Accession number

OA20.1965

Copyright

Location

20th and 21st c Australian art

Further information

Born in England, Charles Meere trained in design and mural painting in London and spent a period studying painting in France in the 1920s. He settled in Sydney in 1932, and during the years of economic depression sought work primarily as a commercial artist. In 1934 he established a commercial art business and taught life classes at the East Sydney Technical College from 1936 while also pursuing his ambition to work as a mural painter.

‘Australian beach pattern’ is Meere’s most celebrated work and a major painting in the iconography of the Australian beach. In the 1930s, the image of the beach-goer had emerged as a new Australian national ‘type’. Figures such as life savers and surfers were identified as akin to a modern breed of classical Greek gods, with strong bodies that were a product of their environment. Meere, who was not a beach-goer himself, had previously used such popular imagery in his commercial poster work. Once labelled as ‘Spartans in Speedos’, the heroic proportions of the figures in ‘Australian beach pattern’ allude to this classical athleticism, while appearing unflinchingly modern in their physicality and fashion.1

A celebration of physical culture in the inter-war period, this painting has contributed more than any other towards the myth of the Australian nation as told through the metaphor of the sunbather - young, healthy, sporty and outdoor loving. Yet with its Herculean figures, impeccable formal arrangement and subdued colouring invigorated by brash red accents (a product of Meere’s eye for commercial colour and design), the work’s precision creates a hyper-real atmosphere. It is through such qualities that ‘Australian beach pattern’ has more recently been used to critique the notion of a racial ideal which, as Meere’s painting shows, renders the figures as physically perfect yet ultimately inhuman.

1 Linda Slutzkin, ‘Spartans in Speedos’ in Creating Australia: 200 years of art 1788-1988, International Cultural Corporation of Australia, Art Gallery of South Australia, 1988

Bibliography (42)

Deutscher and Hackett fine art auction: Melbourne 26 November 2008 (Nov 2008), Deutscher and Hackett, Melbourne (Australia, estab. 2007) (Compilator), Deutscher and Hackett, Melbourne (Australia, estab. 2007), Woollahra, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

The Bodysurfers (2008), Robert Drewe (Australia) (Author), Penguin Books Australia P/L, Victoria, Australia.

The new McCulloch's encyclopedia of Australian art (2006), Susan McCulloch (England; Australia, b.1949) (Author), Alan McCulloch (Australia, b.1907, d.1992) (Author), Emily McCulloch Childs (Australia, b.1976) (Author), The Miegunyah Press (Australia), Carlton, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

The Sydney Morning Herald (26 Dec 2005), Paul McGeough (Australia) (Editor), John Fairfax & Sons (Australia), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Art Monthly Australia (Dec 2005-Feb 2006), Deborah Clark (Australia) (Editor), Art Monthly Australia Pty Ltd (Australia), Acton, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia.

On holidays: a history of getting away in Australia (2005), Richard White (Australia, b.1951) (Author), Pluto Press Australia Ltd. (Australia), North Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Insites (Summer 2005), Charmaine Moldrich (Australia) (Editor), Clare Strong (Australia) (Editor), Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1980), Glebe, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Bondi: a biography (2005), Richard Taylor (Australia) (Author), Museum of Sydney (Australia, estab. 1995), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Through artists' eyes: Australian suburbs and their cities 1919-1945 (2004), John Slater (England) (Author), The Miegunyah Press (Australia), Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Strike a pose: Hunter art.1 art tourist 2004 (2004), Merryn Gates (Australia) (Author), Anita Callaway (Author), Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery (Australia), Lake Macquarie, New South Wales, Australia.

Body culture: Max Dupain, photography and Australian culture, 1919-1939 (2004), Isobel Crombie (Australia) (Author), Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia (Australia, estab. 2002), Peleus Press (Australia), Mulgrave, Victoria, Australia.

The Sydney auction: Australian and International Art: Fine Art, 4 March 2003 (2003), Deutscher-Menzies Fine Art (Australia) (Author), Deutscher-Menzies Fine Art (Australia), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

The beach (2002), Robert Rosenblum (Author), Alannah Weston (United States of America) (Editor), Windsor (United States of America), Florida, United States of America.

Aspects of Art Deco in Australia: Sunrise over the Pacific (2001), Mark Ferson (Australia) (Editor), Mary Nilsson (Australia) (Editor), Craftsman House (Australia), St Leonards, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Sand in our souls (2001), Leone Huntsman (Australia) (Author), Melbourne University Press, Carlton South, Victoria, Australia.

Look (Jul 2000), Judith White (Australia) (Editor), Fiona Hardie (Australia), South Yarra, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Australian modern masters and 19th & 20th century Australian and International Fine Art: Fine Art auction 3 & 4 May 2000 (2000), Chris Deutscher (Australia) (Author), Deutscher-Menzies Fine Art (Australia), Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

L'Australie: Naissance d'une nation (2000), Georges-Goulven Le Cam (France) (Author), Presses Universitaires de Rennes (France), Rennes, France.

Olympic Opening Ceremony Sydney 2000 (2000), Sydney Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (Australia, estab. 1996) (Editor), Sydney Organising Committee for the Olympic Games (Australia, estab. 1996), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Australian art: in the Art Gallery of New South Wales (2000), Barry Pearce (Australia) (Author), Art Gallery of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1874), Domain, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Aspects of Australian art (2000), Ursula Prunster (Australia) (Author), Jonathan Cooper (Australia) (Editor), Art Gallery of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1874), Domain, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

The beach (2000), Don Featherstone (Australia) (Director), David Woodgate (Australia) (Producer), Featherstone-Centrecoast Productions (Australia), Australia.

Art Gallery of New South Wales handbook (1999), Bruce James (Australia) (Author), Edmund Capon (England; Australia, b.1940) (Director), Trustees of the Art Gallery of New South Wales (Australia), Domain, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Australian readers - Discovering Democracy - Middle Primary Collection (1999), Curriculum Corporation (Author), Curriculum Corporation, Carlton South, Victoria, Australia.

Art is ... making, creating and appreciating 2 (1999), Sandra Jane (Author), John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Milton, Queensland, Australia.

Discovering Democracy, Middle Secondary Units (1998), Jane Angus (Editor), Carolyn Glascodine (Editor), Marion Russell (Editor), Barbara Vaughan (Editor), Curriculum Corporation, Carlton, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

Eyewitness travel guides: Australia (1998), Zoë Ross (Editor), Dorling Kindersley Limited, London, England.

Looking At Australia (1997), Donald Williams (Australia) (Author), McGraw-Hill Book Company Australia Pty Ltd (Australia), Australia.

Art in Australia: from Colonization to Postmodernism (1997), Christopher Allen (Australia) (Author), Thames and Hudson (England), London, England.

Wool in the Australian imagination (1994), Author Unknown (Author), Historic Houses Trust of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1980), Glebe, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Art now: Contemporary art post - 1970 (1994), Donald Williams (Australia) (Author), Colin Simpson (Australia, b.1960) (Author), McGraw-Hill Book Company Australia Pty Ltd (Australia), Australia.

Two hundred years of Australian painting: nature, people and art in the southern continent (1992), Barry Pearce (Australia) (Author), Patricia McDonald (Editor), Haruo Arikawa (Japan) (Author), Chikashi Kitazaki (Japan) (Editor), Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Japan), Tokyo, Japan.

National life and landscape - Australian painting 1900-1940 (1990), Ian Burn (Australia; United States of America, b.1939, d.1993) (Author), Bay Books Pty. Ltd. (Australia), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Art deco painting (1990), Edward Lucie-Smith (Jamaica; England, b.1933) (Author), Phaidon Press Ltd (United Kingdom), Oxford, England.

Creating Australia: 200 years of art 1788-1988 (1988), Daniel Thomas (Editor), Ron Radford (Australia, b.1949) (Assistant Co-ordinator), International Cultural Corporation of Australia (Australia), Melbourne, Victoria, Australia.

National Trust magazine [no. 41] (Sep 1987), Editor Unknown (Author), The National Trust of Australia (Australia), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Australia - the painter's vision (1987), Graeme Sturgeon (Australia, b.1936, d.1990) (Author), Bay Books Pty. Ltd. (Australia), Kensington, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

On the beach (1982), Linda Slutzkin (Australia, d.2005) (Author), Art Gallery of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1874), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Bulletin (27 Aug 1952), Editor Unknown (Editor), John Haynes and J.F. Archibald (Australia, estab. 1880, closed 1984), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Daily telegraph and daily news (21 Aug 1952), Editor Unknown (Editor), Australian Consolidated Press (Australia), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Sun (21 Aug 1952), Unknown (Australia) (Editor), Star and Sun Limited (Australia, estab. 1910, closed 1988), Sydney, New South Wales, Australia.

Exhibition history (11)

On the beach: Australian Artists at the shore, (05 Dec 1994–05 Feb 1995), at Museum of Modern Art at Heide (Australia, estab. 1993, closed 1998), 7 Templestowe Road Bulleen, Victoria, Australia 3105.

On the Beach, (08 Dec 1982–28 Dec 1982), at Art Gallery of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1874), Art Gallery Rd Domain, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia 2000.

Celebrity Choice - Sam Neill, (08 Jan 1987–08 Feb 1987), at Art Gallery of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1874), Art Gallery Rd Domain, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia 2000.

"When I was young...": artists' impressions of childhood, (09 Nov 2002–02 Feb 2003), at Global Arts Link (Australia), Cnr Limestone and Nicholas Streets Ipswich, Queensland, Australia 4305.

Strike a pose, (13 Feb 2004–04 Apr 2004), at Lake Macquarie City Art Gallery (Australia), 1A First Street Booragul, New South Wales, Australia 2284.

Two hundred years of Australian painting : Nature, people and art in the southern continent, (14 Jul 1992–06 Sep 1992), at The National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (Japan), Enshoji-oho, Okasaki Sakyou-ku Kyoto, Japan.

Ready, set, ... go! Sporting life and Australian art, (18 Aug 2001–11 Nov 2001), at Global Arts Link (Australia), Cnr Limestone and Nicholas Streets Ipswich Queensland 4305.

Charles Meere A.R.C.A. (1952), (20 Aug 1952–28 Aug 1952), at David Jones' Art Gallery, Sydney (Australia, estab. 1928), 7th Floor Elizabeth Street Sydney, New South Wales, Australia 2000.

Archibald, Wynne and Sulman (1940), (22 Jan 1941–23 Feb 1941), at Art Gallery of New South Wales (Australia, estab. 1874), Art Gallery Rd Domain Sydney New South Wales Australia 2000.

Art Deco 1910-1939, (27 Jun 2008–05 Oct 2008), at NGV: International (Australia, estab. 2003), 180 St Kilda Road Melbourne Victoria Australia 3000.

Two hundred years of Australian painting : Nature, people and art in the southern continent, (28 Apr 1992–28 Jun 1992), at National Museum of Western Art, Tokyo (Japan), Tokyo Japan.