Title

Interior with wardrobe mirror

1955

Artist

Grace Cossington Smith

Australia

1892 – 20 Dec 1984

Artist profile

Alternate image of Interior with wardrobe mirror by Grace Cossington Smith

Details

Place where the work was made

Turramurra → Sydney → New South Wales → Australia

Date

1955

Media category

Painting

Materials used

oil on canvas on paperboard

Dimensions

91.4 x 73.7 cm board; 103.0 x 85.0 x 5.6 cm frame

Signature & date

Signed and dated l.l. corner, black ink "G.Cossington Smith 55".

Credit

Purchased 1967

Location

South Building, ground level, 20th-century galleries

Accession number

OA11.1967

Copyright

© Estate of Grace Cossington Smith
Reproduction requests

Artist information

Grace Cossington Smith
Artist profile

Works in the collection

26

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About

My chief interest, I think, has always been colour, but not flat crude colour, it must be colour within colour, it has to shine; light must be in it, it is no good having heavy, dead colour … The room is in my own home here, and the sunlight did not come in a definite way but the whole room seemed to be full of light, which is what I want to do more than the actual sunlight. I feel that even the shadows are subdued light and they must have light in them as well as the light parts.

Grace Cossington Smith, 1965

In this painting, short brushstrokes of pure colour animate the pictorial surface, highlighting Grace Cossington Smith’s skill as a colourist. By the mid 1950s the artist had begun to concentrate primarily on domestic interiors, party due to the fact that her much-loved sister had become ill.
Places

Where the work was made

Turramurra
Exhibition history
Shown in 17 exhibitions
- Christmas selection 2 (1955), Macquarie Galleries, Sydney, 07 Dec 1955–22 Dec 1955
- Hunters Hill Art Competition 1956, Hunters Hill Town Hall, , 20 Feb 1956–25 Feb 1956
- Bendigo Art Prize 1956, Bendigo Art Gallery, Victoria, Dec 1956 -
- Sydney painting 1957, Victorian Artists Society, Melbourne, 04 Jun 1957–14 Jun 1957
- Waratah Spring Festival Art Exhibition (1958), Commonwealth Bank, Martin Place, Sydney, 04 Oct 1958–11 Oct 1958
- Macquarie Galleries Adelaide exhibition (1960), Royal South Australia Society of Arts, Adelaide, 30 Aug 1960–10 Sep 1960
- Australian painting today (1960), Legacy House, Orange, 02 Oct 1960–08 Oct 1960
- Acquisitions 1967, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 06 Mar 1968–01 Apr 1968
- Australian women artists: one hundred years, 1840-1940, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 10 Oct 1975–02 Nov 1975
- Project 41: The mosaic -The grid (1983), Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 25 Mar 1983–24 Apr 1983
- Twentieth century Australian masterworks from the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the Fred Williams Pilbara series from the collection of CRA Limited, Tokyo Metropolitan Teien Art Museum, , 04 Oct 1985–06 Nov 1985
- Older Australian masters: an exhibition of works by major Australian artists executed in the later years of their careers, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 16 Mar 1992–12 Apr 1992
- Australian Painters Seeing Cézanne, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 28 Nov 1998–17 Jan 1999
- Australian icons: twenty artists from the collection, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 04 Aug 2000–03 Dec 2000
- Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 04 Mar 2005–13 Jun 2005
  
  Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 29 Jul 2005–09 Oct 2005
  
  Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 29 Oct 2005–15 Jan 2006
  
  Grace Cossington Smith: a retrospective exhibition (2005), Queensland Art Gallery, South Brisbane, 11 Feb 2006–30 Apr 2006
- O'Keeffe, Preston, Cossington Smith: Making Modernism, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne, 12 Oct 2016–19 Feb 2017
  
  O'Keeffe, Preston, Cossington Smith: Making Modernism, Queensland Art Gallery/Gallery of Modern Art, Brisbane, 11 Mar 2017–11 Jun 2017
  
  O'Keeffe, Preston, Cossington Smith: Making Modernism, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 01 Jul 2017–02 Oct 2017
- 20th-Century galleries, ground level (rehang), Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 20 Aug 2022–2023
Bibliography
Referenced in 37 publications
- Jenny Aland and Max Darby (Editors), Art Connections, 'Art media: materials, techniques, and tools or equipment', pg. 69-80, Port Melbourne, 1998, 78 (colour illus.).
- Art Gallery of New South Wales, Art Gallery of New South Wales picturebook, Sydney, 1972, 108 (colour illus.).
- Janine Burke, Australian women artists 1840-1940, Collingwood, 1980, (colour illus.).
- Edmund Capon AM, OBE and Jan Meek (Editors), Portrait of a Gallery, 'Australian 20th Century Art', pg. 71-89, Sydney, 1984, 86 (colour illus.), 87.
- Joan Chambers and Sophia Watson, Art in the sun, 'Grace Cossington Smith 1892-1984', pg. 32, Brookvale, 2000, 32 (colour illus.).
- Mary Eagle, Art and Australia (Vol. 38, No. 1), 'Drusilla Modjeska's "Stravinsky's Lunch"', pg. 65-67, Sydney, Sep 2000-Nov 2000, 66 (colour illus.).
- Deborah Edwards, Australian art: in the Art Gallery of New South Wales, 'Mosaic and figure', pg. 213-214, Sydney, 2000, 219 (colour illus.), 302.
- Joanna Gilmour, Portrait profile: Grace Cossington Smith, 'Portrait profile: Grace Cossington Smith', pg. 2-7, Canberra, 2009, 7 (colour illus.).
- James Gleeson., Australian painting today, 'Introduction', Orange, 1960. cat.no. 51
- Deborah Hart, Grace Cossington Smith, 'Radiance: a state of being', pg. 76-93, Canberra, 2005, 80, 81 (colour illus.), 105, 159, 180.
- Glenis Israel, Art Wise - Visual Arts years 7-10, Queensland, 1997.
- Glenis Israel, Artwise: visual arts 7-10, Milton, 2004, 128 (colour illus.), 129.
- Bruce James, Art Gallery of New South Wales handbook, 'Australian Collection: Painting and Sculpture', pg. 102-181, Sydney, 1999, 160 (colour illus.).
- Bruce James, Australian painters of the twentieth century, 'Grace Cossington Smith', pg. 40-51, Sydney, 2000, 50 (colour illus.), 51.
- Rosemary Lloyd, Yearbook of comparative and general literature [Vol. 49, 2001], 'Objects in the mirror: gendering the still life', pg. 39-55, Bloomington, 2002, 48, 55 (illus.).
- Drusilla Modjeska, Stravinsky's lunch, 'To Paint What She Saw: Grace Cossington Smith', pg. 203-334, Sydney, 1999, (colour illus.). plate no. 40
- Barry Pearce and Patrick McCaughey, Twentieth century Australian masterworks from the Art Gallery of New South Wales and the Fred Williams Pilbara Series, Tokyo, 1985, 21 (colour illus.). cat.no. 6
- Barry Pearce., Older Australian masters: an exhibition of works by major Australian artists executed in the later years of their careers, 'Preface', Sydney, 1991, (colour illus.). not paginated, no catalogue numbers
- Barry Pearce, Art Gallery of New South Wales handbook, 'Australian', pg. 13-35, Sydney, 1988, 30, 31 (colour illus.).
- Ursula Prunster, Australian painters; Seeing Cézanne, 'An era of staunch individuals: the 1940s to 1960s', pg. 9-12, Sydney, 1998, 11, 16(colour illus.), 31. cat.no. 40
- Ursula Prunster, Classic Cézanne, 'Seeing Cézanne: Australian affinities', pg. 61-71, Sydney, 1998, 68 (colour illus.), 70. figure no. 33
- Zoë Ross (Editor), Eyewitness travel guides: Australia, 'Botanic gardens and the Domain', pg. 101-111, London, 1998, 108 (colour illus.).
- John Saxby, Look, 'A window opens on new stories about building the collection', pg. 26-28, Sydney, May 2015, 26 (colour illus.), 28.
- Linda Slutzkin, Interiors - from the collection of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 1981, 12. cat.no. 18
- Alison Small, Art and Artists of Australia, Melbourne, 1981, (colour illus.).
- Susannah Smith, Look, 'Mirror, mirror', pg. 46, Sydney, Nov 2015, 46 (colour illus.).
- Virginia Spate, Art Monthly Australia, 'Amazing Grace: Thoughts inspired by the Grace Cossington Smith exhibition at the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra', pg. 22-30, Canberra, Aug 2005, 29 (colour illus.), 30.
- Daniel Thomas, Art Gallery of New South Wales Quarterly, 'Grace Cossington Smith', pg. 510-521, Sydney, Jan 1970, 523 (illus.).
- Daniel Thomas, Art and Australia, 'Grace Cossington Smith', pg. 300-312, Sydney, Mar 1967.
- Judith White, Look, 'In the Steps of the Master', pg. 18-19, Heidelberg, Dec 1998-Jan 1999, 18 (colour illus.).
- Judith White, Look, 'Life, love and the woman artist', pg. 22, Melbourne, Sep 1999, 22.
- Donald Williams, In our own image: the story of Australian art, Sydney, 2002, 93, 94 (colour illus.).
- Donald Williams, In our own image: the story of Australian art, Sydney, 1995, 104 (colour illus.).
- Editor Unknown (Editor), The Sydney Morning Herald, Sydney, 07 Dec 1955.
- 1967 Acquisitions, Sydney, 1967, 22. cat.no. 28
- Project 41 - the mosaic, the grid, Sydney, 1983, 4 (illus.). cat.no. 5
- Editor Unknown (Editor), Daily telegraph and daily news, Sydney, 07 Dec 1955.