Kingsclere, 52 Macleay Street

Tempe Manning was one of a number of talented artists who studied under Antonio Dattilo-Rubbo at his atelier in Sydney from the mid-1910s. Along with her more celebrated peers, including Grace Cossington Smith, Roland Wakelin, Norah Simpson and Roy De Maistre, her work contributed to the first significant phase of modernist culture in this country.

Manning travelled to Europe and studied in Paris in 1912 prior to joining Dattilo-Rubbo's atelier on her return in 1914. While her training in Paris followed academic traditions, Manning's extant Sydney works demonstrate how she had moved toward experimentation in colour painting by 1916. The same year, a reviewer of the Royal Art Society exhibition noted her work and claimed that Manning had "joined the pointillists ….and the results are certainly amazing".

In 1919, when Manning was experimenting with colour palettes in figure and model studies, she also turned her attention to the developing modern city skyline as a subject for her art. She painted several views of Kingsclere, one of Sydney’s original apartment buildings.

'Kingsclere, 52 Macleay Street' is a vibrant colour portrait of Sydney’s urban transformation in the post-war years. With her signature opalescent, speckled colour inflections, Manning paints a condensed view from possibly from her studio or home window. She juxtaposes the shapes of old, low-rise buildings against the towering presence of Kingsclere. Manning does not paint a grand vision of the new urban ‘high rise’ skyline, but rather an unassuming back view. She presents an intimate vision of the new everyday experiences and vistas of her modern world and the burgeoning metropolis.