Portraits of Modern Evil
Fri, 5 Sept 2008, 09:12 amGordon the Optom2 posts in thread
Portraits of Modern Evil
Fri, 5 Sept 2008, 09:12 amDespite being the grandson of a politician and Fitzroy identity, Albert Tucker was born into poverty and strict Victorian attitudes.
It is 1942, and winter has fallen on Melbourne. Albert (Brendan Ewing), a 29-years old, largely self-taught artist, has returned from the Wangaratta Military Hospital, where he sketched the unspeakable, suppurating wounds of Second World War soldiers. He cannot identify with the new Melbourne, the total collapse of basic morality, and the hard drinking, bawdy 15,000 American soldiers who have arrived in mass to the city. A depressed and broken man, still with strong memories of all his war experiences, Bert is sent to Heidelberg Hospital to overcome his resultant insomnia and despair. He sees apparitions, especially that of young Emily (Amanda Woodhams).
Tucker paints in a similar style to his friends in the ‘Angry Penguin’ group, Nolan and Boyd. A fellow group member is artist Joy Hester (Anita Erceg), whom he marries. An ‘observer’ (Jo Morris) appears to describe in vividly poetic style, the colours of Bert’s paintings. Joy inspires Bert’s art to a new level, as she helps him through his troughs of depression. However whilst he is dejected, he cannot satisfy her romantic needs. She finds relief with Henry (Tomas Papathanassiou).
One of the American servicemen was 21 years old Eddie Leonski (Ben Russell), the ‘soldier from hell’, who commissions Bert to paint a portrait of him, for a gift to send home. Although not truly painted from life, this play forms the premise that Leonski sat several times for Tucker. Leonski charms the girls as he offers to walk them home, but when he asks them to sing to him strangulation is not far behind. There were numerous assaults in the brownout (a less regulated blackout) along with Eddie’s three brutal stranglings. Leonski was known to be a binge drinker, consuming up to 30 beers a night. He boasted to Bert of his drinking, describing his favourite trick – a ‘piss pint’. It became very clear to Bert that he had desires on his wife Joy.
In 1960, filled with a terrifying sense of failure but supported by the generous patronage of John and Sunday Reed, Bert was given a place in the country, to relax and develop his art.
Bert’s mood changes for the worst and Joy divorces him.
This play has many flashbacks, but for clarity (and my sanity) this review has been written in chronological order.
The opening scene is the interior of Bert’s studio in a large shed. Behind is a most authentic street scene (design by Brad Reid), showing the external entrance to the artist’s studio at the far end of the set. Wonderful 40’s costumes, again from Reid. A very powerful and chilling atmosphere is created by Kingsley Reeve’s sound design, a clever and strange blend of stormy weather and Melbourne tram screeches (?) Andrew Earle’s lighting ranged from the warm glow of the studio, to the eerie, dank winter lanes, which, when coupled with the images created by Sohan Ariel Hayes gave a genuine feel of the era.
Direction by Adam Mitchell was imaginative, and filled with drama, often sending a shudder down the spine. He contrasted the happy go lucky atmosphere of the dance hall, with the graphic and totally convincing strangling of the girls. The stranglings made Hitchcock’s shower scene in ‘Psycho’ look like Enid Blyton. The whole cast were outstanding.
For your interest and as an epilogue Tucker found a boom in Australian art, and as President of the Contemporary Art Society he was instrumental in getting public galleries to exhibit the more radical work of the 1940's. Albert depicted the sordid behaviour of prostitutes and the debauched soldiers in his 30-odd ‘Images of Modern Evil’ collection. One painting was of murderer Leonski. This ‘Image’ series, influenced by his Marxist, self-regulating and confrontational personality, secured him a scholarship to art school, and a small income through the post war depression.
During the next decade, he was to face many personal traumas and hardships. His son, Sweeney, committed suicide in 1979. Shortly before his death on 23rd October 1999, Tucker and his second wife, Barbara, endowed the Heide Museum of Modern Art with more than two hundred of his works, totalling $15 million. These works reflect the artist’s struggle to come to terms with a society, which he never accepted. At this point, he realised that many of the people, who had influenced and changed his life, had died so he was motivated to immortalise them in paint. The result was another series, ‘Faces I have met’.
A painting sold this year for $840,000, showing how well respected his work is, in Australian Contemporary art.
This is one of the best plays this year, a complete, thorough and well thought out production.
Despite being the grandson of a politician and Fitzroy identity, Albert Tucker was born into poverty and strict Victorian attitudes.
It is 1942, and winter has fallen on Melbourne. Albert (Brendan Ewing), a 29-years old, largely self-taught artist, has returned from the Wangaratta Military Hospital, where he sketched the unspeakable, suppurating wounds of Second World War soldiers. He cannot identify with the new Melbourne, the total collapse of basic morality, and the hard drinking, bawdy 15,000 American soldiers who have arrived in mass to the city. A depressed and broken man, still with strong memories of all his war experiences, Bert is sent to Heidelberg Hospital to overcome his resultant insomnia and despair. He sees apparitions, especially that of young Emily (Amanda Woodhams).
Tucker paints in a similar style to his friends in the ‘Angry Penguin’ group, Nolan and Boyd. A fellow group member is artist Joy Hester (Anita Erceg), whom he marries. An ‘observer’ (Jo Morris) appears to describe in vividly poetic style, the colours of Bert’s paintings. Joy inspires Bert’s art to a new level, as she helps him through his troughs of depression. However whilst he is dejected, he cannot satisfy her romantic needs. She finds relief with Henry (Tomas Papathanassiou).
One of the American servicemen was 21 years old Eddie Leonski (Ben Russell), the ‘soldier from hell’, who commissions Bert to paint a portrait of him, for a gift to send home. Although not truly painted from life, this play forms the premise that Leonski sat several times for Tucker. Leonski charms the girls as he offers to walk them home, but when he asks them to sing to him strangulation is not far behind. There were numerous assaults in the brownout (a less regulated blackout) along with Eddie’s three brutal stranglings. Leonski was known to be a binge drinker, consuming up to 30 beers a night. He boasted to Bert of his drinking, describing his favourite trick – a ‘piss pint’. It became very clear to Bert that he had desires on his wife Joy.
In 1960, filled with a terrifying sense of failure but supported by the generous patronage of John and Sunday Reed, Bert was given a place in the country, to relax and develop his art.
Bert’s mood changes for the worst and Joy divorces him.
This play has many flashbacks, but for clarity (and my sanity) this review has been written in chronological order.
The opening scene is the interior of Bert’s studio in a large shed. Behind is a most authentic street scene (design by Brad Reid), showing the external entrance to the artist’s studio at the far end of the set. Wonderful 40’s costumes, again from Reid. A very powerful and chilling atmosphere is created by Kingsley Reeve’s sound design, a clever and strange blend of stormy weather and Melbourne tram screeches (?) Andrew Earle’s lighting ranged from the warm glow of the studio, to the eerie, dank winter lanes, which, when coupled with the images created by Sohan Ariel Hayes gave a genuine feel of the era.
Direction by Adam Mitchell was imaginative, and filled with drama, often sending a shudder down the spine. He contrasted the happy go lucky atmosphere of the dance hall, with the graphic and totally convincing strangling of the girls. The stranglings made Hitchcock’s shower scene in ‘Psycho’ look like Enid Blyton. The whole cast were outstanding.
For your interest and as an epilogue Tucker found a boom in Australian art, and as President of the Contemporary Art Society he was instrumental in getting public galleries to exhibit the more radical work of the 1940's. Albert depicted the sordid behaviour of prostitutes and the debauched soldiers in his 30-odd ‘Images of Modern Evil’ collection. One painting was of murderer Leonski. This ‘Image’ series, influenced by his Marxist, self-regulating and confrontational personality, secured him a scholarship to art school, and a small income through the post war depression.
During the next decade, he was to face many personal traumas and hardships. His son, Sweeney, committed suicide in 1979. Shortly before his death on 23rd October 1999, Tucker and his second wife, Barbara, endowed the Heide Museum of Modern Art with more than two hundred of his works, totalling $15 million. These works reflect the artist’s struggle to come to terms with a society, which he never accepted. At this point, he realised that many of the people, who had influenced and changed his life, had died so he was motivated to immortalise them in paint. The result was another series, ‘Faces I have met’.
A painting sold this year for $840,000, showing how well respected his work is, in Australian Contemporary art.
This is one of the best plays this year, a complete, thorough and well thought out production.
not for me