Near McMahons Point

Masterpiece@IXL Fine Art Gallery is proud to announce the coming of age of a painter whose work is gaining widespread recognition.

Richard Maurovic has overcome devastating injury to produce an impressive body of paintings depicting the man-made world of today in a style that has been praised by Jeffrey Smart, Australia’s leading ‘Precisionist’ painter:

“Richard Maurovic is a living testament to the victory of “mind over matter”.
“Despite great difficulties, he has produced an impressive body of work.
“Buon lavoro, Richard!”

The creative urge can be powerful enough to overcome almost any adversity. Monet, for example, painted masterpieces despite his failing sight; crippled by arthritis, Renoir produced his best work; and Vincent van Gogh’s life was a battle with inner demons.

A horse-riding accident in 1986 left Richard Maurovic a quadriplegic. He started painting full time in 1989; unable to hold a brush or a pencil, he straps them to his wrists to paint works of startling clarity and detail in watercolour and acrylics.

The exhibition opens at 6:00pm on Friday June 4 at the Masterpiece@IXL Fine Art Gallery and continues until Saturday June 19.

He has previously exhibited in his home town, Adelaide, and in Sydney; this is is his first Tasmanian show. He has won numerous awards: in 2006, his portrait of wheelchair athlete Suzanne Twelftree won first prize at the South Australian Royal Society for the Arts 150th anniversary exhibition and in 2008 his works were purchased for the Parliament House collection in Canberra and the prestigious Kedumba Drawing Collection in New South Wales.

He was South Australian Citizen of the Year in 1997 and in 2001 the Commonwealth Government awarded him a Centenary of Federation medal. In 2009 the City of Salisbury named him as one of its Living Legends for his contribution to art and the community.

Maurovic has been an accomplished athlete specialising in fencing and wheelchair rugby, representing Australia in both sports. He has won awards for his art, sporting achievements and civic pursuits.

Maurovic’s first book, The Meat Game, a history of the meat industry, published by Wakefield Press, was a number one selling book in South Australia in August 2007. In April 2008, The Meat Game was awarded a bronze medal in London for culinary history; a second edition is due shortly. His next book will be released in 2011.

On Saturday June 5 he will be in attendance at Masterpiece@IXL 10am—12 noon and 1pm—4pm to meet the press and interested members of the public.

07185
Arne Brewster
Government Stores on Hunter’s Island, Hobart, Tasmania, 1830
Oil on prepared artist’s board
50.8 x 76.2 cm
Signed & dated lower right

08085
John Gould
‘Osphranter rufus‘ (Great Red Kangaroo)

02070
Robert Young
“It’s Six Hundred Feet Deep Here!”
Watercolour
26.3 x 37 cm
Signed lower right

06242
Haughton Forrest (1826-1925)
The Esplanade, Derwent River, New Norfolk 1910
Oil on academy board
29.7 x 45.8 cm
Signed lower right

Visit our Haughton Forrest portfolio. Click any image to see larger version.

07182
David Mackay Harrison (1941 – )
Lauren – Reclining Edition A/P
Bronze Sculpture
Length: 550mm Width: 280mm
Height: 320mm Weight: 12kg
Signed with initials

Visit our David Mackay Harrison portfolio. Click on any image for a larger version.

At a Distance by Ken Johnson

Visit the Ken Johnson portfolio. Click any image for a larger version.

07053
John Glover (1767 – 1849)
Mill on the Tiber(After Claude) c. 1840
Oil on canvas
76 x 114 cm
Unsigned

This previously unrecorded painting would appear to be the companion picture to the Tasmanian version of Landscape with Piping Shepherd, a free, ‘from memory’ copy of Glover’s other Claude, The Mill on the Tiber.

The rediscovery of this work is therefore a matter of considerable art-historical interest.

Like many of Glover’s oils, the work was cleaned and relined early last century, resulting in the loss of the artist’s delicate, translucent glazes in some areas.

Nevertheless, it is clearly from the artist’s hand and from his Australian years. To begin with, it is painted on a canvas measuring 76 x 114cm (2ft 6in x 3ft 9in), his ’standard size’ in Tasmania. The bright blue sky with its separate layers of cirrus and cumulus clouds is characteristic of the later Glover, as is the dappled sun and blue of the distant hills.

The sinuous curves of the central tree, the ’split-brush’ foliage, and the low light touching the edges of leaves are all typical elements of Glover’s vocabulary of landscape forms.

Furthermore, the treatment of the empty foreground, with its touches of russet and mossy green is strongly reminiscent of that in two late views of Tivoli.

Dr David Hansen
Curator, John Glover and the Colonial Picturesque
(Tasmanian Museum & Art Gallery and Art Exhibitions Australia, 2003)

05215
Haughton Forrest (1826-1925)
(Man O’War accompanied by Yacht)
Oil on canvas
45.8 x 72 cm
Signed lower left

03200
Haughton Forrest (1826-1925)
“Barn Bluff”
Oil on academy board
21.5 x 33.7 cm (oval)
Signed lower left