Gordon Bennett, Possession Island, 1991, oil and synthetic polymer paint on canvas, two parts: 162 x 260cm (overall). © The Estate of Gordon Bennett, Purchased with funds from the Foundation for the Historic Houses Trust, Museum of Sydney Appeal, 2007, Collection: Museum of Sydney, Sydney Living Museums.
“I wanted Gordon Bennett’s work to speak for itself rather than layer it with interpretations.” — Z A R A S TA N HOPE
30, he explored this with enormous passion and fearlessness as he acknowledged and embraced his dual identity. “It all came pouring out at art school,” Stanhope says. “He had been going to a psychotherapist and reading a lot of psychology and wanted to make some art as a result. It was all bottled up in there. You can see how he was expressing himself through image-making.” This, she says, very quickly formed into the finer practice we now know and have seen develop. Equally formative was his exposure to postmodernism and French structuralism, and thinking about how to create his art in that context. He went on to relentlessly explore appropriation, the weight of art history, expression of identity and the effects of the conscious and unconscious on collective and individual psyches. Being awarded the Moët & Chandon Australian Art Fellowship, resulting in a year’s residency in France during 1991-92, was pivotal. Stanhope says the paint-
ing that won him the fellowship—The nine ricochets (Fall down black fella, Jump up white fella)—is rich with such layering. Bennett was well-known for avoiding interviews; there is little evidence of him in the exhibition displaying a public face. “We wanted to make sure we held to the integrity of the work and allow his voice to come through,” Stanhope says. “It is a show where you can spend a lot of time and see the variety in his work: you can look at a series but then also look at the connections between the series.”
Unfinished Business: The Art of Gordon Bennett
Queensland Art Gallery | Gallery of Modern Art (Stanley Place, South Brisbane QLD) 7 November 2020—21 March
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