Window into the colourful world of two of our finest …
Margaret Olley and Vida Lahey are titans of Queensland art, so it makes sense to exhibit them together – and that’s exactly what Brisbane art dealer Philip Bacon is doing.
An exhibition of the work of much-loved Australian artist Margaret Olley is a rare event nowadays and sure to pull a crowd. A stunning array of her art, now showing at Philip Bacon Galleries in Brisbane, accentuates her presence, even in her absence.
Olley died in 2011 and since then her popularity has grown and grown. Her close friend and art dealer Philip Bacon says simply, “everyone loves her”.
Why? Well, the work for one thing. Her paintings are simply beyond beautiful and her interiors are rich and, as Bacon points out, contemplative.
Yellow Interior painted in 1989 is typical of her oeuvre. As much as it is a painting of an interior in her Sydney home it also works as a kind of figurative mandala. And while there is no obvious human presence in the picture, the spirit of Olley could be imagined to be hovering in the ether.
Anyone who has visited the Tweed Regional Gallery & Margaret Olley Art Centre, just across the border, will have seen the three-dimensional scaled-down version of the home that was also her studio. Visiting that exhibit you feel like she has just stepped out of the room. It’s the same at Philip Bacon Galleries.
In fact, for a moment, I am taken back and I have a vision of her cutting through the packed gallery with her walker. Moses, she called it, because the crowd parted like the Red Sea when she was coming through.
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Olley was loved not only for her art but for her support of other artists (and people in general) and her benefaction. An example of her generous spirit is pointed out to me by Bacon as we wander through the gallery and pause in front of a work that, at first, I think must be a corner in her home. But the title tells another story. At David Strachan’s house, painted in 1973.
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Margaret Olley’s David Strachan’s house, 1973
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Margaret Olley’s Compotier and basket of mandarins, 1966
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Margaret Olley’s Figs, 1979
Bacon explains that after Strachan was killed in a car accident, his friend Margaret Olley would visit his house and paint the interior as a kind of homage and remembrance of him. That was a demonstration of her generous spirit. In fact, a QAGOMA exhibition in Brisbane in 2019 was called Margaret Olley: A Generous Life.
There are early watercolours and paintings in this exhibition, including a stunning 1944 portrait, Eileen Kramer – an east Sydney Technical College Life model. Some of the watercolours are from her travels Then there are the still lifes and interiors that we all love so much.
Bacon has been showing Olley’s work since 1975. The works in this exhibition come from various sources.
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“Many of the works in this exhibition I sold when they first came out of Margaret’s studio, such as Sunday Flowers, which was in her 1977 exhibition here when it was priced at $925,” Bacon says. “What a great investment that proved to be for the canny buyer as it is now listed at $125,000.”
The 26 works here cover her entire exhibiting life, which makes this show as edifying as it is entertaining. She lived much of her life in Sydney but Olley was schooled in Brisbane and lived here. While they tend to claim her south of the border (she was born in Lismore), she’s regarded as a local here.
And it’s a lovely synergy that her work is counterpointed by an exhibition on downstairs in the gallery. It features the work of another revered artist Vida Lahey, one of Queensland’s favourites.
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Vida Lahey’s The Chinese bowl, 1931
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Vida Lahey’s Evening on the Derwent, 1924
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Vida Lahey’s White ginger, 1952
Her works in the Queensland Art Gallery are hugely popular – Monday Morning painted in 1912 is a classic. The paintings and watercolours in the current exhibition are a gorgeous window into her world.
In a catalogue essay by respected art historian Bettin MacAulay we read about her life and legend. MacAulay quotes former QAG director Doug Hall, who said in his foreword to a major 1989 retrospective that Lahey “was considered one of Australia’s best known and respected artists”.
Having Margaret Olley and Vida Lahey juxtaposed in this way creates what is really a museum quality show and a rare opportunity not to be missed.
Margaret Olley and Vida Lahey: Paintings & Watercolours, on show at Philip Bacon Galleries, Fortitude Valley, until May 24.