Title
Aboriginal glyph
(circa 1958)
Artist
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Details
- Date
- (circa 1958)
- Media category
- Materials used
- colour stencil, gouache with gouache hand colouring on thin black card
- Edition
- Unknown edition
- Dimensions
- 34.3 x 28.5 cm sheet (irreg.)
- Signature & date
Signed l.l. within image, black ball-point pen "Margaret Preston". Not dated.
- Credit
- Gift of the artist 1960
- Location
- 20th-century galleries (ground floor)
- Accession number
- DA2.1960
- Copyright
- © Margaret Rose Preston Estate/Copyright Agency
- Artist information
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Margaret Preston
Works in the collection
- Share
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About
This coloured stencil was shown in the last decade of Margaret Preston’s life when her most original work was in printmaking. She turned with renewed attention to monotype and stencil, and studied the techniques of Chinese and Aboriginal artistic practices.
The work uses an ‘Aboriginal’ palette of ochre shades and mimics the organic rhythms of New South Wales dendroglyphs – culturally significant designs commonly carved into living tree trunks by Wiradjuri people. These had been among the first objects to arouse Preston’s interest in Aboriginal art and suggested to her a means by which she could forge new ways of both being modern and Australian in her art.
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Exhibition history
Shown in 7 exhibitions
Purchases and Acquisitions for 1960, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 22 Mar 1961–23 Apr 1961
Hand and eye - a survey of artists' materials and techniques: Art Gallery of New South Wales Travelling Art Exhibition 1970, Various venues, , 1970–1970
1988 Australian Biennale: from the Southern Cross: a view of world art c.1940-88, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 18 May 1988–03 Jul 1988
1988 Australian Biennale: from the Southern Cross: a view of world art c.1940-88, National Gallery of Victoria [St Kilda Road], Melbourne, 04 Aug 1988–18 Sep 1988
Modernism 1900-1950: prints and drawings from the collection, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 23 Jul 1994–25 Sep 1994
Australian icons: twenty artists from the collection, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 04 Aug 2000–03 Dec 2000
Margaret Preston retrospective, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 29 Jul 2005–23 Oct 2005
Margaret Preston retrospective, Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia, Melbourne, 12 Nov 2005–29 Jan 2006
Margaret Preston retrospective, Queensland Art Gallery, South Brisbane, 18 Feb 2006–07 May 2006
Margaret Preston retrospective, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 26 May 2006–13 Aug 2006
20th-Century galleries Rehang (Ground Level), Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 20 Aug 2022–2023
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Bibliography
Referenced in 9 publications
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Elizabeth Butel, Margaret Preston: the art of constant rearrangement, Ringwood, 1985, 93. cat.no. P.71
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Roger Arthur Butler, The prints of Margaret Preston: a catalogue raisonné, Canberra, 2005, 324 (colour illus.). cat.no. 391
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Roger Arthur Butler, The prints of Margaret Preston: a catalogue raisonné, Canberra, 1987, 292 (colour illus.). cat.no. 391
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Dennis Colsey, Hand and eye - a survey of artists materials and techniques: Art Gallery of New South Wales Travelling Art Exhibition 1970, Sydney, 1969, (illus.). cat.no. 54 (a)
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Deborah Edwards, Margaret Preston, ‘An art for Australia from Australians 1940s-1950s', pg.173-250, Sydney, 2005, 247, 248 (colour illus.).
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Renée Free, Modernism 1900-1950: prints and drawings from the collection, Sydney, 1994.
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Ian North, The art of Margaret Preston, South Australia, 1980, 58 (illus.). cat.no. P.43
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Alison Small, Art and Artists of Australia, Melbourne, 1981, colour illus..
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Nick Waterlow (Director), The 1988 Australian Biennale: from the Southern Cross: a view of world art c.1940-88, List of works in the exhibition 276-282, Sydney, 1988, 281.
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