Publications

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Tim Georgeson, Hidden Theatre

Tim Georgeson
Price A$ 60     

Hidden Theatre is a haunting meditation on the unvarnished power and beauty of the landscape despite this damaging history of colonisation that created so-called Australia. That which is hidden in this immersive forest – spiritual entities that live on Country, including ancestors, tree spirits, fog nymphs, animal voices, and so on – are heard and become visible through connection and exchange. The result is a unique collaboration between an Indigenous artist and non-Indigenous artist whose work offers creative strategies for decolonising the land and the way it has been framed by the European settler imagination.

 

Dr Daniel Mudie Cunningham

Written on Gadigal Country, December 2022

Formist



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The Dictionary People
The unsung heroes who created the Oxford English Dictionary

Sarah Ogilvie
Price A$ 35     


What do three murderers, Karl Marx's daughter and a vegetarian vicar have in common?
They all helped create the Oxford English Dictionary.

The Oxford English Dictionary has long been associated with elite institutions and Victorian men; its longest-serving editor, James Murray, devoted 36 years to the project, as far as the letter T. But the Dictionary didn't just belong to the experts; it relied on contributions from members of the public. By the time it was finished in 1928 its 414,825 entries had been crowdsourced from a surprising and diverse group of people, from archaeologists and astronomers to murderers, naturists, novelists, pornographers, queer couples, suffragists, vicars and vegetarians.

Lexicographer Sarah Ogilvie dives deep into previously untapped archives to tell a people's history of the OED. She traces the lives of thousands of contributors who defined the English language, from the eccentric autodidacts to the family groups who made word-collection their passion. With generosity and brio, Ogilvie reveals, for the first time, the full story of the making of one of the most famous books in the world - and celebrates to sparkling effect the extraordinary efforts of the Dictionary People.

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Bumpy Roads and Tip Top Sandwiches

Eliza Gosse
Price A$ 120     

'Bumpy Roads and Tip Top Sandwiches' is a collection of paintings by Eliza Gosse based on Aussie road trip recollections. Luggage obscuring the rearview mirror, chip packets stuffed in car doors - the sanctuary of the motel hours away. Spanning several decades these stories share the highs and lows of families on holiday in Australia.

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CHARLIE SHEARD: The Music of Pure Abstraction

E.S. Pettit
Price A$ 150     

Catalogue Raisonné of respected Australian painter Charlie Sheard Preface by Zhang Zikang, the Director of the Central Academy of Fine Arts Museum, Beijing.

A respecter of tradition, yet one who is not afraid to engage and play with tradition, Sheard admires the genius and bravery of innovators and outsiders, art's icons and the anonymous alike, who have one thing in common: their ability to uncover what he calls “spiritual reality”.



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Valerie Marshall Strong Olsen
A Rare Sensibility

Tim Olsen and Louise Olsen with Kylie Norton (ISBN 978-0-646-84150-2)
Price A$ 40     

Exhibition catalogue to accompany the exhibition, Valerie Marshall Strong Olsen at the National Art School November 2021.



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Son of the Brush
A memoir

Tim Olsen (ISBN 9781743318058)
Price A$ 35     

Allen & Unwin Australia

Tim Olsen is the son of arguably Australia's greatest living artist, Dr John Olsen. Son of the Brush is his fascinating, candid memoir of what it was like to grow up in the shadow of artistic genius, with all its wonder, excitement and bitter disappointments.


Tim's childhood was dominated by his father's work, which took the family to Europe and to communities around Australia as John sought inspiration and artistic fellowship. Wine, food, conversation and the emerging sexual freedom of the 1960s wove a pattern of life for the family. It was both the best and worst of childhoods, filled with vibrancy and stimulation, yet fraught with anxiety and eventual sadness as John separated from Tim's mother Valerie and moved away from the family.

The course of Tim's life has been set by the experiences of his childhood, and by the passion for art he inherited from both his parents (his mother was an acclaimed painter in her own right). Art has always been at the very centre of Tim's world, although he has followed a different path from his parents. Having overcome and recovered from addiction, Tim is today one of Australia's most respected art dealers, with a knowledge of art and artists forged from what is literally a lifetime immersed in the art world.

Son of the Brush is a memoir about a son and his father, and what it takes to forge your own identity and chart your own course in life, but it is also about the wider world of art, artists and the joy, inspiration and sacrifices of the creative life.


John Olsen's Studios
Owlswood and Hidden Lake NSW

Ken McGregor (ISBN 9781925984798)
Price A$ 44     

Every artist needs a studio. The photographs in this book show John Olsen working in two studios in New South Wales – ‘Owlswood’ and ‘Hidden Lake’. We see him surrounded by books on artists he admires, the works of inspirational poets and, of course, his favourite Mediterranean cookbooks. Multiple tables are laden, somewhat chaotically, with paints, pencils, crayons and brushes, while he is seen painting at his easel or at a table laid out with precious Torinoko paper.

Author and photographer Ken McGregor reminds us of the significant drawings and prints the artist has created in these two studios.

‘The studio is where the art of contemplation is incorporated into the process of painting’ – John Olsen

George Byrne: Post Truth

George Byrne (ISBN 9783775752534)
Price A$ 80     


This is the second edition of the Post Truth.
Published by Hatje Cantz, Berlin

It contains a selection of over 60 high-quality monographs, all images that at some point were printed and exhibited internationally by George Byrne between 2015-2022. The book is 144 pages, hard cover, smith sewn, cloth over board. The book is printed on high quality art paper (Magno Satin ) & printed by Dr. Cantz'sche Druckerei in Stuttgart, Germany.

In order to publish this book, George worked with three highly respected collaborators: Producer/Editor - Stephanie Emerson, Designer - Michael Worthington (counterspace.net) and writer - Ian Volner. Ian Volner is a NYC based novelist and freelance architecture/culture writer whose essay introduces the book.



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Des Oiseaux

Leila Jeffreys, Guilhem Lesaffre
Price A$ 80     

Leila Jeffreys takes us with this book into a journey through tropical forests and jungles all over the world towards astonishing bird species that she has been taking studio portraits of since 2008: “I’ve long noticed how many birds have specific expressions, just like us”, she explains. Jeffreys’ images, which rely on a profound connection with her sitters cultivated over many years, are an exercise in both artistry and empathy. Cultivating the art of waiting, Jeffreys develops a gallery of whimsical and hyper-realist portraits where all the birds come attired in their most beautiful finery with sumptuous plumage colors. One by one, they let their character shine through: graceful, mischievous, shy, proud, timid, poseur, all of which seem to want to chat to the viewer. Her practice underlines how humans anthropomorphize animals and what we really do share. 

 

This publication is part of the Des oiseaux (On birds) collection celebrating, through the vision of different artists, their immense presence in a world where they are now vulnerable. Accompanying these photographs, the ornithologist Guilhem Lesaffre writes a special essay. Titles in this collection include: Graciela Iturbide, Michael Kenna, Yoshinori Mizutani, Bernard Plossu, Pentti Sammallahti, and Terri Weifenbach.



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Stephen Ormandy | Only Dancing

Formist
Price A$ 55     

Only Dancing is the first publication dedicated to surveying Ormandy’s vibrant, large-scale oil painting and the playfulness he brings to everything he does.

Macau Days

Brian Castro & John Young (ISBN 978-0-9953925-2-6)
Price A$ 45     


John Olsen: The You Beaut Country
Catalogue - National Gallery of Victoria

Edited by David Hurlston and Deborah Edwards (ISBN 9781925432169)
Price A$ 0       

John Olsen: The You Beaut Country offers an unparalleled exploration of Olsen’s consummate place in Australian art history. His You Beaut Country series, which followed his return to Australia in 1960 after three years travelling in Europe, began what would be a lifelong interest in representing the landscape and Australian identity.


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The Art of Dinosaur Designs

Louise Olsen, Stephen Ormandy (ISBN 9781921383960)
Price A$ 80     


My Salute to Five Bells

John Olsen (ISBN 9780642278821)
Price A$ 30     

This book is a deeply personal look at one of the most significant modern artworks in Australia. In this new publication written by the artist himself, John Olsen reflects on his Sydney Opera House mural and Kenneth Slessor’s poem, Five Bells, which inspired it.

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Birdland

Leila Jeffreys (ISBN 9780733631061)
Price A$ 50     

In Birdland, Australian fine-art photographer Leila Jeffreys presents us with a bird-watching experience like no other, drawing birds out from their leafy shadows and airy territories and presenting them to us with the skill and intricate detail of a portrait painter. The result is a stunning encounter with some of the world's most beautiful birds.

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The King Sun
John Olsen - A portrait at 85

ABC
Price A$ 35     

In The King Sun, director Tony Williams and producer Anna Hewgill follow the progress of John Olsen’s mural from the arrival of the 8 blank panels to the transportation, delivery and installation of the giant painting in the Collins Square development in Melbourne.





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Chris Langlois: Points In Time

Katherine Roberts and Simon Gregg (ISBN 978-0-9873896-1-9)
Price A$ 25     


Culinaria
The Cuisine of the Sun

John Olsen
Price A$ 10     

A Collection of John Olsen’s Favourite Dishes Recipes in Collaboration with Andy Harris
50 page full colour catalogue accompanying the exhibition of the same name, 3 - 21 March 2010. $30.00 including postage

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John Olsen
Journeys into the 'You Beaut Country'

Jenny Zimmer & Ken McGregor (ISBN 978-1-921394-05-8)
Price A$ 120     

At 80 John Olsen is widely acknowledged as the grand old man of current Australian art. Yet, writing as someone who has reviewed art over the years in 20 different countries, I cannot help regretting that John's art is still so little known outside this country. Not only does this deprive the artist of the kind of international recognition he deserves but it also deprives a potential world-wide audience of a truly rich and life-enhancing experience.

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The Land Beyond Time: A modern exploration of Australia's North-West frontiers

John Olsen, Mary Durack, Geoffrey Dutton, Vincent Serventy, Alex Bortignon (ISBN 0333357051)
Price A$ 60     

Lavishly and profusely illustrated with colour photographs as well as stunning artworks by John Olsen in colour and black and white. The enormous North-West of Australia is a region totally different from anywhere else in the world. It is a world of immense contrasts, seething social ferment, overwhelming natural beauty and terrifying isolation. This large territory is too big to be seen from a single point of view. In this book, 5 different personalities each gives his or her view of the North-West, from Broome to the harsh estuary of the Prince Regent River.