NEW DIRECTION

🔴🟠🟡🟢🔵🟣⚫️ NEW DIRECTION Ed. No. 208 - SNIPPETS FROM THE PAST

THE CURTAIN WENT UP WITHOUT ME

(Perceptions and Reality)

Title: "The Curtain went up without me." (Circa 1980's)

Artist: Neville Williams / © Arts Law Australia

Media: Conté crayon, poster paint on cartridge paper (Framed)

Size: 60cm (H) x 42cm (W)

PRIVATE COLLECTION

🔴

SOME REFLECTIONS ON THE PAST

During a clean up of my photographs from the past

I came across old snippets of three artworks from my earlier creative days.

I believe these artworks were all made in the late 1970's/80's.

Press clipping from the front page of "The Sydney Morning Herald" (1987)

Painting Title: "Another Picture of Laurie"

Artist: Neville Williams / © Arts Law Australia

Media: Acrylic on stretched canvas (Framed)

Size: 150cm (H) x 250cm (W) (Approx.)

OVERPAINTED

Looking at this portrait artwork (above) in retrospect it wasn't a very loose or spontaneous expression. But then I was totally immersed in the stifling bureaucracy of the Public Service.
I was most certainly glad to get away from all of that maze. I think that is where my disappointment for bureaucracy had its gestation.

My experience of those years left the impression on me of how small minded and smothered humanity can become. These bureaucratised systems create a vacuum that invites in the likes of a Trump, Putin, Hanson (or China) to come along and bowl the whole thing over like skittles. Surrounding ourselves with these egocentric blinkered systems just smothers initiative, genuine creativity and acceptance of responsibility.

It's weird that Government Ministers hold the perception of having ALL the power and taking ALL the responsibility. And it hasn't changed. Leaders of all persuasions including politicians need to start sharing the reality of it ALL around if they want to keep their jobs in the fast arriving brave new world. It is such a paradox that people need to be given responsibility (something too many don't want to accept) to help them move forward.

Do we want it all too easy?

There's no sugar-coating it... or perhaps that is the best way to address it? "A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down" according to Mr. Disney in his version of writer

P.L. Travers "Mary Poppins". But then he was a master of fantasy and illusion. We need some r-e-a-l-i-t-y. This is hard work for everyone. And the hard work of taking on the challenge of one's own life for most human beings is anathema. Easier to blame the leaders.

Well, that's been the default mode through history.

Government Departments and instrumentalities too often are very unhealthy environments where the public servants run round like impotent minions bumping into one another.

This only encourages little power cliques or fiefdoms of the un-empowered.

Leaders need to be able to delegate power and responsibility.

Those who can't (or won't) accept it are in the wrong job.

Let us hope that this disparity between the top tier and the rest is one of the weird society aberrations that will be early to go in the "new age" with the existing governing structures beginning to crumble. But I repeat that means more responsibility and initiative being accepted further down the line. I find the need to repeat myself more these days because people have their noise/volume control turned up between our ears.

So much rubbish to deal with in our lives!

What we are seeing unfold is what happens when you treat people like mushrooms keeping them in the dark drip feeding them unconsciously an ignorance of themselves.
People are living breathing humans not nothing.

This artwork though certainly was seen.
What better gallery than the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald?

What do you feel the painting was/is trying to say?
The picture here was my entry in the Archibald Prize 1987 (rejected).

The artwork was titled "Another Picture of Laurie".

Laurie Brereton seemed to be the NSW Minister for Everything leading into the 1988 Australian Bicentenary.

He wasn't liked but we sure did ask for him. People still wouldn't see why.

Too many are asleep and nowhere near the wheel of steering their own lives.

There were and are of course people who shine a light in the public service across the spectrum but generally our way of government needs an overhaul top to bottom. That statement also applies to the nation in general. Things aren't flowing as they should. All of this change we're experiencing is our separation from our foundation at work moving to correct the imbalance. It is most discomforting for us all.

But becoming a zombie is not healthy for anyone either. Nature balances.

Having said all of that I also need to add that for much of my time working for government I was given a good amount of freedom to create some really spectacular exhibitions at times overseeing projects involving 200+ people. But then the environment I was working within was exceptional in that my section (i.e. public relations) plugged directly into the Minister's Office. This is what happens in a top heavy world.

And too there was real and keen co-operative support by key players at a grassroots level. That was very much appreciated. When people understand they are fuelling something worthwhile (big picture) rather than just building one person's ego a whole lot of creative stuff can happen.

Too many spend too much time hiding behind impossible walls of unnecessary protection, procrastination, indecision and fear. They end up impotent and very frustrated. And then wonder why they become so angry when abruptly woken by reality.

People need to be encouraged to "have a go".

This is something Australians previously regarded as part of the fabric of the Nation.

_____________________

Title: "Tamarama Days" (Circa 1979)

Artist: Neville Williams / © Arts Law Australia

Media: Oil on stretched canvas (Framed)

Size: Approx. 150cm x 100cm

PRIVATE COLLECTION

This painting 'Tamarama Days' was a reflection of a type of formal perfection

I was seeking at this time. Read inflexible. Surface.
I wanted everything in its place, proper and right.
Of course life doesn't work that way.

PIC: The artist (circa 1970's)

It was an easier time in some regards.

Regular gym, the beach, the nightclubs.

I was at the zenith of a very ordered premeditated lifestyle.

A very gay hedonistic time for me.

Appearance was everything.

Tamarama Beach was where the beautiful people went

and probably still do.

PIC: The artist (circa 1980's)

The perception was that I was riding the wave.

The reality though was that I felt empty and wanting of something more. Beached.

In the painting we see people on a beach oblivious to the threatening storm

of our own ignorance on the horizon. And that hasn't changed.

If anything the storm is getting closer (or is it a raging tsunami roiling in?)

Heaven only knows what the solo beach chair was doing there?
(Perhaps a deck chair from the Titanic had floated ashore? Ha!)
I guess the deck chair is at least occupying the space?

I think I was trying to be arty.

Eventually we are brought down to earth.

__________________________________

Title:"The Curtain went up without me." (Circa 1980's) >>>

Artist: Neville Williams / © Arts Law Australia
Media: Conte crayon, poster paint on cartridge paper (Framed)
Size: 60cm (H) x 42cm (W)
PRIVATE COLLECTION

This drawing kind of looked sad and downbeat.

A vaudeville coat hanging on a coathanger. It's the only picture I have of this drawing and does not show what was a burst of colour in the lapel in the form of a deep crimson flower.

May I muse a bit here please?

Interestingly this artwork had a "brother" artwork that showed a vaudeville performer wearing the same coat, flower and hat though the boater obscured his face. There was also a curtain rising hence the title...

"The Curtain Rises". I have no photographic record of this artwork.

I recall too that this work was sold through a private gallery and do you know the owners of this Sydney Eastern Suburbs art gallery (now long gone) told me it was purchased

by a "well known" person but wouldn't tell me who? This smacked of elitism.

I am making this comment here about those who believe themselves to be better than others.

i.e. Those who believe themselves to be entitled in some form or other.

I found out who purchased the artwork only because a friend had seen it on one of the midday shows on TV with the late Bernard King showcasing his home. "The Curtain Rises" artwork was destroyed in his Balmain house fire. As far as I'm aware no picture of that artwork exists.

A bit of trivia.

Some 'think' they know better and believe they are better. Those gallery owners held off paying me for months. It just all didn't feel right. That was the end of my relationship with private galleries. The art world at times can be a most suitable metaphor providing an example of those who consider themselves above the everyday. Too often art is packaged as something almost 'divine' and 'rarified'. Does it need to be? Perhaps it should be brought back to how Shakespearean plays were presented in their times. Art that speaks to people...even invites their participation.

People should be able to relate and feel comfortable walking into an art show and want to be there and enjoy being there.

Perhaps I'm being a bit disingenuous and paradoxical to my previous comments when saying that too often at art shows the "wannabeseens" arrive and turn their backs to the art and proceed to quaff their glass of whatever while chattering away with their "white noise vacuous colleagues". Some people's idea of being comfortable is doing what they want, when they want, how they want with their over the top expectations being fulfilled at every turn. But I'm talking about enjoying by letting balance, self-awareness, civility and a degree of deserved regard enter the scene.

At one exhibition I witnessed someone place their glass of bubbly on a plinth that had a sculpture positioned as the centrepiece in the exhibition space.

And like sheep others followed to do the same. The plinth then became dominated by the showcasing of half empty glasses of grog. Courtesy and awareness?

That behaviour is being disrespectful to the exhibiting artist who has put in the effort.

This reminds me too of seeing something similar in a theatre once where a person in the front row of the audience actually had their feet cross legged resting on the stage during the performance. It was a thrust stage so everyone could see him from almost every seat around the amphitheatre. He drew the focus away from the actor on stage. The actor glared at the person continuously while remaining in character but that stubborn 'attention wannabe' kept his feet resting on that stage. The smug look on his face spoke that he knew exactly what he was doing.

The born to rule are not. Not anymore.

The brave new world is upon us all now.

More responsibility carried down the line is needed.

A common courtesy needs to be found.

Kudos needs to be shared around too not held onto by those who believe themselves to be entitled. A more balanced world needs to be initiated to allow our emerging brave new world to prosper.

We are living in an "Age of more self-responsibility".

Good to do some reflecting on times left behind.

And thank you for taking the time. - N.

PS I've heard it said that the only thing that human beings do well is enjoy themselves.

But looking around that can surely be questioned too. Unbelievable stupidity is manifest currently.

We want to feel good but are doing just about everything we can to produce the opposite.

A word for it is disconnection. The action word for our times is RE-CONNECTION. - N.

STOP, LOOK AND LEAP. - Neville Williams