Sidney Nolan

(1917-1992)

Central Australian Desert, 1950

Footnotes

PROVENANCE
The Collection of Amina and Franco Belgiorno-Nettis AC CBE, Sydney

EXHIBITED
possibly Flotta Lauro Art Prize, David Jones' Gallery, Sydney, 31 August - 8 September 1951

Like many of Sidney Nolan's views of the outback interior, Central Australian Desert is painted from an aerial perspective lending it a sense of vastness and remoteness that characterises this important group of works painted in 1950, just prior to his departure for London the following year. Painted in quick succession at his home in Wahroonga, New South Wales, most of the paintings were exhibited in two shows at Stanley Coe Gallery in Melbourne and David Jones Gallery in Sydney. Lord Richard Casey commented of the paintings in the Melbourne catalogue that Nolan, "may well be the man we have been hoping would arise – someone who is capable of expressing with size and vision what many Australian's feel, and deeply feel, about this great and unusual country.'1

Between June and September of 1949 Nolan travelled to Central Australia, the Northern Territory, Western Australia and South Australia with his new wife Cynthia, née Reed, and her daughter Jinx. The journey, which took three months, became the inspiration for this series of paintings and also Nolan's slightly later group of works depicting the ill-fated Burke and Wills expedition and their epic struggle for survival in the outback. Cynthia Nolan also wrote a novel of the experience, simply titled Outback and published in London in 1962, which describes the journey with considerable insight. Nolan took many photographs, especially from the aeroplanes they charted to the more remote communities. These photographs fused with the rich memory bank of images he stored in his mind, Nolan created a superb body of work which captured the isolation and expanse of the vast outback, rarely visited by Australians in the 1950s.

Related works such as Central Australia, collection of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, and Inland Australia, collection of the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, which won the inaugural Dunlop Australian art prize in June 1950, are key examples of this unique group. All capture a timeless view of the interior in its dramatic contrasting hues of the brilliant blue sky against the rich, red undulations of this ancient landscape.

1 Sidney Nolan, Central Australian Landscapes, 3 - 13 July 1950, Stanley Coe Galleries, Melbourne