VSA2230

Australian art: 1880s to the present

Leigh Astbury

8 points
* 3 hours per week
* First semester
* Clayton
* Prerequisites: Two subjects at first-year level in visual arts or a comparable discipline

Objectives Upon completion of this subject students will have a sound general knowledge of major developments in twentieth-century Australian art; be able to contextualise these developments within a broader social and historical framework; understand expressions of an Australian cultural identity as changing cultural constructions.

Synopsis A study in major issues in Australian art from the 1880s to the present. After some discussion of relevant issues in the nineteenth century, the subject will concentrate on selected themes in twentieth-century art. Themes include the landscape as subject matter and the changing attitudes towards nature; the search for an Australian identity through art practice; the emergence of particular Australian myths; the influence of American abstract art in the 1960s; the manifestation of pluralism and the appearance of feminist art in the 1970s; the return to figuration in the 1980s; and the rise of contemporary Aboriginal art.

Assessment Seminar paper (1500 words): 25%
* Essay (3000 words): 50%
* Visual test (1.5 hours): 25%

Prescribed texts

Burn I and others The necessity of Australian art: An essay about interpretation Power, 1988
Haese R Rebels and precursors Penguin, 1988
Smith B Australian painting rev. edn, OUP, 1991
Smith B The critic as advocate OUP, 1989
Smith B The death of the artist as hero OUP, 1988
Sturgeon G The development of Australian sculpture, 1788- 1975 Thames and Hudson, 1978
Taylor P (ed.) Anything goes: Art in Australia, 1970- 1980 Art and Text, 1984
White R Inventing Australia: Images and identity 1688- 1980 Allen and Unwin, 1981