Sir Sidney Nolan was a leading artist of the 20th century. His Ned Kelly paintings became iconic, and today the Sidney Nolan Trust, which he founded in 1985, celebrates his life-long experimentation and passion for creativity, as well as his love for the environment.
Located at The Rodd, the Trust cares for his former home, studio, and 250-acre estate, together with a large collection of Nolan’s artworks, his library and personal archive.
The Rodd is located in NW Herefordshire, a stone’s throw from the England Wales border. It encompasses Rodd Court, a Jacobean manor house, which was the last home of Sidney and his wife Mary, an outstanding group of 17th century farm buildings that house our gallery, workshops, and offices and is surrounded by beautiful gardens and orchards. Rodd Farm and estate extend to 250 acres of farmland, semi-ancient natural woodland and the Hindwell brook. A changing display of works from the Nolan collection can be seen at The Rodd.
The Rodd is also home to Nolan’s last studio, the only to survive, and remains largely untouched. The studio provides visitors with a rare insight into Nolan’s materials and processes and is an important resource for continued research.
Situated in one of the 17th century barns, the studio contains over 1,000 items including cans of Nolan's favourite spray paints; stocks of dry pigment waiting to be mixed with the ‘new’ white glue, PVA; alkyd gel medium; and tins of household enamel. The flat bench that he worked on is covered in paintbrushes, spatulas, and paints, as if poised for another painting session. Nolan would often work in this space with the large wooden doors pulled closed, lit only by a powerful single halogen lamp hanging high above, as if to mimic the direct Australian sunlight.
When I visited the exhibition in the Gallery was 'Nolan à l’Atelier 17'. Nolan's etching experiments from his time at the famous Paris print workshop were presented alongside magnificent artworks by leading surrealists of the day.
Also on display in the grounds and house were sculptures by Daniel Pryde-Jarman and Simon Dorell's 'Jackdaws for company'. The latter being the result of Dorrell's solitary ramblings at The Rodd during lockdown. His ink and gouache paintings of the house and historic farm buildings present a unique record of The Rodd resting dormant.
The next exhibition in the Gallery is one I have previewed for Artlyst - 'Sidney Nolan: Colour of the Sky - Auschwitz Paintings'. "I do not see how the question of the camps can be forever shelved. Perhaps they will never be the material of art, it is impossible to tell. How can a disease be painted?" Read my preview here.
'Passion (1940-45): Representing the Holocaust', 21 August, 2 pm, The Rodd is an illustrated lecture by London-based art historian Monica Bohm-Duchen that will set the powerful works by Sidney Nolan on view at The Rodd in a broader cultural and theological context by considering those artists - most but not all of them Jewish - who from the late nineteenth century onwards, but above all in the shadow of World War Two and the Holocaust, chose to represent Jesus as the Jew he historically was, and as an emblem of Jewish suffering in the present. For more on this theme, see my Church Times article here.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Midnight Oil - Forgotten Years.
No comments:
Post a Comment