artist profile: grace cossington smith

earlier in the week i posted some work done in a post- or neo-impressionist manner.
one of my favourite australian artists who also painted in this style was grace cossington smith (1892-1984), a leading sydney painter in the australian modernist movement.
i first became aware of cossington smith when i read stravinsky’s lunch by drusilla modjeska (one of my favourite australian writers).

recognised for her vibrant use of colour, gcs depicted scenes of every day and domestic life in sydney, where she lived in her family home in turramurra for most of her years. her subject matter was diverse and included everything from street scenes and bustling crowds to bush landscapes and still lifes.

gcs is best known for her interior scenes. these depict an intimate and personal world in radiant colours, lending a spiritual quality to the oil paintings.

although keenly attentive to the modern urban environment, gcs brought a deeply personal, intimate response to the subjects of her art. recurring themes were the metropolis and its new bridge, portraits, still lifes, landscapes, religious and war subjects, theatre and ballet performances, and domestic interiors infused with light.

gcs was only 23 when she painted the sock knitter (1915, art gallery of nsw). despite her youth, the bold picture – showing  a girl (believed to be her youngest sister, charlotte) knitting socks during wartime – is considered by many to be the first post-impressionist work carried out in australia and a key picture in the modernist movement.

above all gcs concerned herself with depicting scenes of everyday life. soldiers marching (1917) juxtaposes an urban australian street scene with the timely relevance of soldiers marching off to war in europe, while paintings like centre of a city (1925) show people dwarfed by towering skyscrapers.

perhaps the most famous painting by gcs, the bridge in curve (1930, ngv) shows the two ends of the sydney harbour bridge rising up to each other in near-completion. but it is not the industrial fascination of this period that i’m most drawn to.

in works like interior with veranda doors (1954), interior with blue painting (1956), and interior with wardrobe mirror (1955) the viewer is offered glimpses and snapshots into an intimate, interior world.

gcs was born in neutral bay, sydney, on 22 april 1892. at school she studied with albert collins and alfred coffey, and in 1909 started at the royal art society of new south wales under dattilo rubbo.

from 1912-14 she travelled in europe and attended drawing classes in germany as well as at the winchester school of art in england. when she returned to australia, she continued her studies with dattilo rubbo.

although the sock knitter is an important modernist work, it wasn’t until her association with fellow students roland wakelin and roy de maistre – leading to the formation of the contemporary group in 1926 – that the bulk of her contribution to the modernist movement really began.

gcs demonstrated a more open, experimental and personally resolved style than many of her male contemporaries and she produced works of art that challenged convention and opened new pathways to modernism. she  lived a quiet life, surrounded by female friends and relatives, but in no way did she see herself as anything other than a professional artist whose vision was original and integrity absolute.

following her father’s death in 1938, she moved from her garden studio to a room within the family home – and began painting the series depicting intimate views of her room. these are by far my favourite paintings of her oeuvre.

interior (1958, qld art gallery)

interior in yellow (1962-64, nga)

interior with wardrobe mirror (1955, art gallery of nsw)

in interior with wardrobe mirror gcs recreated her bedroom from multiple perspectives. two wardrobe doors are open; one revealing a close-up of drawers within the cupboard, the other with a mirror reflecting the garden and sky outside. it is a miraculous, poetic integration of intimate interior space and the exterior sun-filled environment – the parts and the whole illuminated by vibrant colour. as in all her late interiors, we become aware of spaces in which complexity is made to look effortless.