The reject shop:The works the Archibalds didn’t want

This week has served up a powerful reminder that fame in art may be long,but celebrity in politics is strictly ephemeral.The Archibald Prize rolls around every year with cosmic regularity,but governments come and go,and when they change,the entire personality of a nation is changed.

The difference is that a new group of highly motivated independents have entered public life,upsetting the traditional balance between the two major parties. While it’s still too early to say whether this indicates a lasting rearrangement of the political landscape,it’s reassuring to find that conservative,conscientious people care so deeply about issues such as climate policy,corruption and inequality,as to throw over all their traditional party allegiances.

The teal revolution allows one to hope that Australia is still the land of the fair go,and the success of these candidates should motivate the Labor Party to govern more boldly in key areas. It suggests we are not,after all,a nation of “quiet Australians” who will let our political masters do whatever they please with taxpayers’ money.

Salon de Refuses finalist Zoe Young’s The Sisters,featuring Bianca and Allegra Spender.

Salon de Refuses finalist Zoe Young’s The Sisters,featuring Bianca and Allegra Spender.Zoe Young

All of this confers a special distinction on Zoe Young’sThe Sisters (...in black after Hugh Ramsay), which features one of the successful new MPs,Allegra Spender,and her sister,Bianca. If we look to the Archibald Prize to tell us something about the state of Australian society,one could hardly choose a more momentous subject than the seismic shift in the way we vote.

Young’s portraits have been inconsistent in recent times,butThe Sisters is one of her best. Not only is it more assured in execution,but it’s also a clever idea to use Hugh Ramsay’s iconic double portrait of 1904 as a reference. The artist has been smart enough to recognise that it’s better to portray a familiar person in an unfamiliar setting rather than simply underline what we already know. It’s the difference between cliche and delight.

It’s still a dodge to portray fashion designer Bianca with closed eyes (Ramsay would not have approved),but the simplicity of design and the substituting of black for Ramsay’s white works well. Allegra is obviously the true subject,though thankfully there’s not a trace of teal on this canvas.

Evan Salmon’s self-portrait.

Evan Salmon’s self-portrait.Supplied

As for the other portraits in this year’s Salon,they are the usual heterogeneous bunch,and I can single out only a handful. Looking at Evan Salmon’s neat,tonalist self-portrait,I thought I was looking at Max Meldrum. I’m unable to say whether this is a sly gag,or whether Salmon has been possessed by the ghost of the great art guru.

On the whole,such modest character studies fare best in this selection. The exception to the rule is Craig Handley,who is,generally speaking,the exception to every rule. Handley’sMe,13,In the Landscape,features a self-portrait as a schoolboy,set in a pastel-coloured hallucinogenic landscape,with Ronald McDonald and two rosellas. I’ll leave the interpretation to the psychoanalysts,but salute Handley’s ability to always stand out from the crowd.

I enjoyed India Mark’s micro-portrait of fellow artist Nick Santoro (who also has a work in this year’s Salon) and was pleased to see Andrew Sullivan had made it into the hang again,albeit as the subject in an accomplished relief portrait by Noel Thurgate.

Me,13,In the Landscape.

Me,13,In the Landscape.Supplied

Sinead Davies’The Multipotentialite (Sonya Eliopulos),has been used in the pre-publicity for this year’s exhibition,and rightly so. It’s one of the most attractive pictures on display,with something almost ritualistic in this vision of an impassive woman holding an orchid in her right hand while dropping one from her left. Davies has illuminated the crucial details,from the face and flowers to the outline of the subject’s blouse,with great subtlety against a purple-grey backdrop.

Turning to the Wynne Prize rejects,the Salon entries usually indicate the Art Gallery of NSW Trustees are poor judges of landscape and sculpture. That holds true again this year,although I can’t argue against the 2022 winner,Nicholas Harding’s big bush painting,Eora,which was one of the standouts.

Sinead Davies’ The Multipotentialite (Sonya Eliopulos).

Sinead Davies’ The Multipotentialite (Sonya Eliopulos).Supplied

I’d be more convinced of their acumen had they found room for works such as Peter Godwin’sLast Night and Mist,Colo River and Canoe Creek Junction,a moody evocation of place in which a dark forest looms menacingly over a reflective pool of water. The setting is bushland not far from Sydney,but there are distinct echoes of the fantastic mountains of Guilin,where Godwin has painted in the past. There’s a looseness in the brushwork that tells us the picture is based on a distant memory,not plein air observation.

James Rogers’sJazzbo is a thoroughly musical,abstract metal sculpture in which one can almost hear the notes tumbling over one another. The piece is silent,but with a noisy,syncopated feeling. It’s static but conveys the sensation of rapid movement. Few Australian sculptors can get so much out of a few sheets of old iron.

Joshua Cocking’s self-portrait,The Inward Urge.

Joshua Cocking’s self-portrait,The Inward Urge.Supplied

Mary Tonkin’sHot Kiss,Kalorama,is another eye-catching work – a snapshot of dense undergrowth in which the play of light has an electric quality. The artist tells us in her statement that the work was informed by an actual kiss,but all that eros has been transferred into the way she has depicted the bush. Tonkin has been more successful in infusing an emotional charge into the painting than Jo Bertini,whoseAn Unquiet History,is an assault on the senses,with its palette of acid pink and yellow. There is much to like in this work,but the colours are so hot one needs protective goggles.

We’ve become familiar with Robyn Sweaney’s precisely painted suburban houses,and there’s no diminution in quality withThis Distanced Life,which features a white weatherboard bungalow with a corrugated iron roof. The red earth tells us we’re not far from the Outback – Broken Hill,in fact.

There’s competition in suburbia from Christopher Zanko’sWandering the LGA (Wollongong),a fastidiously carved portrait of a suburban house,coloured with just as much care and devotion. Five extra plants have been included as satellites,apparently ready to be affixed to the main picture if so desired.

Finally,a word of praise for Joshua Cocking,whose self-portrait,The Inward Urge,shows a man with a lot of baggage sitting in the middle of nowhere. It would be an excellent model for the official portrait of the outgoing prime minister.

Salon des Refusés is at theS.H. Ervin Gallery until July 24.

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John McDonald is the film critic for AFR Weekend. He also writes about the arts for The Sydney Morning Herald.

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