Title
Nostalgia for the sky
1942
Artist
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Details
- Date
- 1942
- Media categories
- Drawing , Sketchbook
- Materials used
- alkyd and oil on ivory wove paper (page from spiral bound sketchbook)
- Dimensions
- 24.6 x 27.1 cm sheet
- Signature & date
Not signed. Dated u.l. corner verso, pencil "1-11-1942".
- Credit
- Purchased 2013
- Location
- Not on display
- Accession number
- 183.2013
- Copyright
- © The Trustees of the Sidney Nolan Trust/DACS. Copyright Agency
- Artist information
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Sidney Nolan
Works in the collection
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About
In 1942, Sidney Nolan was conscripted into the army. For two years he was stationed at Dimboola on the Wimmera River in western Victoria. Ironically, his time here allowed for a period of intense artistic experimentation and existential investigation. Painting the vast and featureless space of the Wimmera flatlands revolutionised his landscapes, but he also turned his attention to the expressive possibilities of the figure.
Studying the writings of Sigmund Freud and Melbourne psychiatrist Reg Ellery during this time inspired a series of surrealist-like figures that channel a sense of wartime menace. These strange characters from Nolan’s Dimboola sketchbook – an upward gazing, feline-like devilish figure and local farmer whose features appear inverted by old age – reveal the psychological portraits Nolan created from people he encountered.
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Exhibition history
Shown in 1 exhibition
20th-Century galleries, ground level (rehang), Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 20 Aug 2022–2023
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Bibliography
Referenced in 2 publications
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Paula Dredge, Sidney Nolan: The Artist’s Materials, Los Angeles, 2020, 24, 25 (colour illus.), 109, 120, 132 (index). fig. 20
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John Saxby, Look, 'A window opens on new stories about building the collection', pg. 26-28, Sydney, May 2015, 28 (colour illus.).
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