A bushwalker’s sketch of a rainforest gully in the Budawang Mountains.

A bushwalker’s sketch of a rainforest gully in the Budawang Mountains.

My first post was about the heart of Phar Lap. Now, it’s great to see the heart on display again – in our newly opened Landmarks gallery.

Phar Lap’s heart installed in its new showcase in Landmarks.

Phar Lap’s heart installed in its new showcase in Landmarks.

Rituals of Seduction: Birds of Paradise a new exhibition at the Australian Museum, Sydney.

Rituals of Seduction: Birds of Paradise a new exhibition at the Australian Museum, Sydney.

Real museums are places where Time is transformed into Space.
Orhan Pamuk, The Museum of Innocence, 2009
he executes with the greatest desire to imitate nature so well as in his power, not only in an elaborate copy of her details, but shall do his best to catch now and then a glimpse of … divine poetical feelings.
von Guérard writing in 1870 about his own art
Eugène von Guérard, Mr Clark’s Station, Deep Creek, near Keilor 1867, oil on canvas, 68.4 x 122.0 cm, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. Purchased with the assistance of the National Gallery Society of Victoria and Mr and Mrs Solomon Lew, 1986.

Eugène von Guérard, Mr Clark’s Station, Deep Creek, near Keilor 1867, oil on canvas, 68.4 x 122.0 cm, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. Purchased with the assistance of the National Gallery Society of Victoria and Mr and Mrs Solomon Lew, 1986.

Divine poetical feelings

The exhibition devoted to Eugène von Guérard at the National Gallery of Victoria is the best experience I have had in an art exhibition in a long time. I well remember the first major von Guérard exhibition in 1980 – the feeling then was one of a rich, almost dense profusion and telling detail. The new exhibition brings out von Guérard’s unique sense of limitless landscape space. And it’s a tribute to the artist as effectively the first curator of the NGV. Brilliant.

Eugène von Guérard, Mr Clark’s Station, Deep Creek, near Keilor 1867 (detail).

Eugène von Guérard, Mr Clark’s Station, Deep Creek, near Keilor 1867 (detail).