Welcoming the first day of the season of renewal: Springtime, 2023, (study), acrylic on canvas mounted on board, 10 x 10 cm.
The tattoo is based on the embroidery Rose Wreath Panel designed by William Morris and embroidered by May Morris c.1890. The embroidery is shown in the second of the two developmental views below.
A slightly belated tribute to Georgiana Burne-Jones, who was born on 21 July, 1840.
Georgiana (née Macdonald), Lady Burne-Jones (1840-1920) was the wife and later, biographer, of eminent Pre-Raphaelite and Aesthetic Movement painter, Sir Edward Burne-Jones.
A promising artist herself, Georgiana Burne-Jones began art classes at the Government School of Design in South Kensington and later became a student of Ford Maddox Brown.
For some time, she continued to draw, embroider and sew costumes to be utilised in artists' paintings.
In 1861, she was employed as a tile painter for the decorative arts firm Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co., but after the birth of her son, Philip, in October of the same year, became a full-time caregiver.
On the lot of women artists, Georgiana Burne-Jones wrote: 'It is pathetic to think how we women longed to keep pace with men, and how gladly they kept us by them until their pace quickened and we had to fall behind'.
Pictured: See me, 2023, acrylic on canvas panel, 10 x 10 cm. The face decoration is based on a detail from the embroidered table cover Australia, c 1888, designed by May Morris, the younger daughter of Georgiana Burne-Jones’s close friend and confidante, William Morris.
Here are a few snaps from Morris and Me, last Saturday’s forum in the Oddie Gallery at the Art Gallery of Ballarat. It was such a pleasure to share the stage with Glenn Barkley and Kate Rohde, along with AGB curator Kiri Smart, who stepped in as facilitator at very short notice.
We couldn’t have wished for a warmer reception. Several people I know travelled long distances to join us (and there was I thinking no one would come). I can’t begin to tell you how much it meant to see you there. In the second last photo below, I’m pictured with Melbourne painter Alicia Cornwell, with whom I went to art school in the 1980s. We’ve seen each other since then, but not in decades. In the final view, Glenn is pictured with his earthenware pot Morris of the ferns with parrot, 2023.On Saturday 15 July at 2 pm, I’m taking part in a forum at the Art Gallery of Ballarat in which sculptor Kate Rohde, ceramicist Glenn Barkley and I will discuss the influence of William Morris on our works in the exhibition, In the Company of Morris. (See also Blog Post Tuesday, June 27).
I’m a longtime admirer of William Morris, but am very possibly the only artist in the exhibition whose current work has been inspired by the work of his younger daughter, May Morris (although I’d dearly love to be proved wrong).
This morning the gallery shared details of the event on their social media pages:
The first of our featured In the Company of Morris artists is Ballarat-based painter and printmaker Deborah Klein who will be participating in our forum on Saturday 15 July titled – Morris and Me. Tickets are now available at
https://www.artgalleryofballarat.com.au/event/forum-morris-and-me….
To read the rest of the post, visit the Art Gallery of Ballarat’s Instagram Page HERE.
Image top: Deborah Klein in In the Company of Morris with Three Women, 2021, synthetic polymer paint on canvas. Purchased with funds from the Art Gallery of Ballarat Foundation, 2023. Photo by Tara Moore.
Kate Rohde’s sculptures Deer Sentinels 2022 and my triptych Three Women, 2021, are the centrefold in the Winter Issue (#7) of Untitled, the Art Gallery of Ballarat Association Magazine.
The images of our works accompany An Inspiring Legacy, Art Gallery of Ballarat Director Louise Tegart’s article about William Morris and his enduring influence on the vast array of historic and contemporary artists in the current exhibition, In the Company of Morris.
SAVE THE DATE
On Saturday, 15 July, from 2-3 pm, I’m joining Kate Rohde and ceramicist Glenn Barkley, whose work also features in the article, for Morris and Me, a panel discussion led by art curator Christopher Menz, about the influence of William Morris (and in my case, the work of his younger daughter, May Morris), on our respective practices.
Tickets to the event include entry to Pre-Raphaelites Drawings and Watercolours from the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford and In the Company of Morris. We do hope you can join us.
Tickets can be purchased here: https://www.artgalleryofballarat.com.au/event/forum-morris-and-me
The Art Gallery of Ballarat has kindly invited me to make available the early editions of the following linocuts (earmarked for a major solo exhibition in 2024) in the Gallery Shop during the run of the exhibition, In the Company of Morris.
As followers of this blog will be aware, my current work draws much of its inspiration from the works of prolific British Arts and Crafts designer and maker, May Morris, daughter of William Morris and Jane Morris and a notable designer for the hugely influential firm, Morris & Co. The tattoos on my anonymous subjects are all based on details from her designs.
The linocuts pictured below were hand-printed in my Ballarat studio. Strictly limited numbers are available for purchase from the Gallery Shop, either in-store or online, HERE until the exhibition concludes on 6 August.
Click on the images to enlarge.
In addition, I will be one of three contemporary artists appearing in the panel discussion Morris and Me, on 15 July at 2 pm. Tickets to the forum include entry to the exhibition and are available HERE.
Image top: Deborah Klein in the Art Gallery of Ballarat shop with linocuts Horn Poppy, 2023 and framed copy of The Heavens Declare #1, 2022 on the wall. My Art Matters earrings were made by the incredible Holly Would from Ballarat-based Femxle Experience Art Rebelion.
Photo credit: Peter Freund.
I’m very much looking forward to previewing Pre-Raphaelites Drawings & Watercolours and In the Company of Morris at the Art Gallery of Ballarat tomorrow evening, ahead of the first day of the exhibitions on Saturday 20 May.
I first came to know and love the work of the Pre-Raphaelites and their contemporaries when I lived in London in the 1970s.
One of the paintings I remember most vividly from my frequent visits to the Tate Gallery (now Tate Britain) is Ophelia (1850-1851) by one of the founding members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, Sir John Everett Millais (1829-1896). In recent years, I’ve developed a particular interest in the women of the Pre-Raphaelite circle, including the model for Ophelia, Lizzie Siddal (1829-1862). Siddal modelled for several members of the group before becoming model, muse and eventually wife to another PRB founder, Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882). A poet and largely self-taught artist of considerable promise, she was the only woman to exhibit at the Pre-Raphaelite exhibition in 1857. Plagued by ill health, her life was cut short by a laudanum overdose at age 32. I’m excited that Pre-Raphaelites Drawings & Watercolours includes her drawing Pippa Passes.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Siddal, Pippa Passes, 1854, pen & brown ink on off-white paper, 23.3 x 29 cm.
Collection Ashmolean Museum, Oxford
From the Art Gallery of Ballarat website:
In conjunction with the Ashmolean Museum exhibition Pre-Raphaelites: Drawings & Watercolours, In the Company of Morris showcases an exhibition of historical and contemporary Australian artworks demonstrating the influence of the Pre-Raphaelites and in particular William Morris.
William Morris, the Pre Raphaelite polymath, visionary thinker, designer, writer, artist, poet, environmental crusader and social activist, was one of the most important and inspiring figures of the 19th century. He believed in the rights of every individual to improve the world and that good design should be available for all as summed up in his statement ‘I do not want art for a few any more than education for a few, or freedom for a few’. In reaction to the Industrial Revolution Morris argued for a return to nature rejecting mass production and commercialism and championing all things handmade. He imagined a future where the world would have ‘a new art, a glorious art, made by the people and for the people’. Morris championed the beauty of handcraft methods based on medieval craft societies and as an active socialist he promoted the artist or maker being involved in all aspects of an artwork’s manufacture….
… In the Company of Morris features work by Louis Abrahams, Janet Beckhouse, Glenn Barkley, George Baxter, Stephen Bird, Frederick Cartwright, Dagmar Cyrulla, Emma Davies, Robert Dowling, HH Floate, Emily Floyd, Cathy Franzi, Web Gilbert, Lucy Hardie, Fiona Hiscock, Henry James Johnstone, Louiseann King, Deborah Klein, Emma Van Leest, Lionel Lindsay, Norman Lindsay, Percy Lindsay, Ruby Lindsay, Marguerite Mahood, ex de medici, Belinda Michael, Ernest Moffitt, Alice J Muskett, Julie Nash, Klytie Pate, Ana Petidis, Elizabeth Pulie, Charles Douglas Richardson, Kate Rohde, Gwen Scott, Bernhard Smith, William Strutt, Philippa Taylor, Kati Thamo, Tiffany Titshall, Christian Waller, Napier Waller, Carole Wilson, Thomas Woolner, Jemima Wyman and Paul Yore.
Pre-Raphaelites: Drawings & Watercolours and In the Company of Morris run from Saturday 20 May to Sunday 6 August.
Pictured top: Exhibition invitation.
Left panel: Deborah Klein, Three Women, (Detail), 2021, synthetic polymer paint on linen.
Right panel: Marie Spartali Stillman, Cloister Lilies, 1891, watercolour and body colour.
As a longtime devotee of the Pre-Raphaelites and their contemporaries, I’m eagerly anticipating the forthcoming exhibition at the Art Gallery of Ballarat, Pre-Raphaelites: Drawings and Watercolours from The Ashmolean Museum, which runs from May 20 - August 6.
My painting Three Women, 2021, will hang at the AGB in the accompanying exhibition, In the Company of Morris, alongside works by historical and contemporary artists who have drawn inspiration from the Pre-Raphaelites, and in particular, William Morris.
It was a very pleasant surprise to discover Three Women, which pays homage to his daughter, May Morris, reproduced in the article linked below.
Pre-Raphaelites: Drawings and Watercolours from The Ashmolean Museum, by Fiona Anderson, WEEKEND NOTES, 19-20 March 2023: https://www.weekendnotes.com/pre-raphaelites-drawings-and-watercolours-the-ashmolean-museum/
Pictured top: Three Women, 2021, triptych, acrylic on linen, 40.5 x 30.5 cm (each panel).
Kicking off the working year: a linocut in progress, part of a series begun in 2022, draws inspiration from Horn Poppy, a wallpaper design by May Morris for Morris & Co., circa 1885. (Page view above, left).