Title
Four uprights, red and black
circa 1965
Artist
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Details
- Other Title
- TP62
- Alternative title
- TP62 (IRN: 25045)
- Date
- circa 1965
- Media category
- Painting
- Materials used
- polyvinyl acetate and pigment on hardboard
- Dimensions
- 122.4 x 183.2 x 2.5 cm
- Signature & date
Not signed. Not dated.
- Credit
- Gift of Frank Watters 2018. Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program
- Location
- Not on display
- Accession number
- 34.2018
- Copyright
- © Estate of the artist/Copyright Agency
- Artist information
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Tony Tuckson
Works in the collection
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About
Tony Tuckson is widely acknowledged as Australia's pre-eminent abstract expressionist painter. From the late 1950s, Tuckson abandoned representations of the figure in his art and developed a spectacular abstract aesthetic that he worked on in various distinct phases throughout the 1960s until his death in the early 1970s. His style moved from an early calligraphic emphasis on mark making to his final sensuous and sweeping veils of paint that one critic referred to as Tuckson's own formula for the sublime.
Tuckson's work contains the gestural hallmarks of the international movements of Abstract Expressionism and Action painting, yet they also confront us as powerfully distinct in their expressive capacities. The works of those who inspired him may have appeared more obvious in the early stages of his practice (the impact of Rauschenberg for example can be detected in his 'red, black and white' series), and yet his interpretation of twentieth century masters produced a style that was in more ways the artist's own.
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Exhibition history
Shown in 8 exhibitions
Tony Tuckson (1970), Watters Gallery, East Sydney, 27 May 1970–13 Jun 1970
Tony Tuckson 1921-1973, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 10 Apr 1976–09 May 1976
Tony Tuckson 1921-1973: a retrospective exhibition, Pinacotheca Gallery, Australia, 13 Oct 1982–30 Oct 1982
Up, down and across, Campbelltown Arts Centre, Campbelltown, 11 Aug 1995–08 Oct 1995
Escape Artists - modernists in the tropics, Cairns Art Gallery, Cairns, 30 May 1998–30 Aug 1998
Escape Artists - modernists in the tropics, Rockhampton Museum of Art, Rockhampton, 23 Sep 1998–31 Oct 1998
Escape Artists - modernists in the tropics, Museum of Brisbane, Brisbane, 21 Nov 1998–10 Jan 1999
Escape Artists - modernists in the tropics, Mosman Regional Gallery, , 19 Jan 1999–24 Feb 1999
Escape Artists - modernists in the tropics, Art Gallery of Ballarat, Ballarat, 05 Mar 1999–09 May 1999
Escape Artists - modernists in the tropics, Perc Tucker Regional Gallery, Townsville, 21 May 1999–27 Jun 1999
Painting forever: The art of Tony Tuckson, National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, 04 Nov 2000–04 Feb 2001
Painting forever: The art of Tony Tuckson, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 23 Mar 2001–20 May 2001
Painting forever: The art of Tony Tuckson, Hazelhurst Arts Centre, , 07 Sep 2001–10 Feb 2002
Painting forever: The art of Tony Tuckson, Art Gallery of Ballarat, Ballarat, 07 Sep 2001–21 Oct 2001
Painting forever: The art of Tony Tuckson, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne, 23 Feb 2002–21 Apr 2002
Frank's flat, Maitland Regional Art Gallery, Maitland, 27 May 2011–17 Jul 2011
Tony Tuckson: the abstract sublime, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 17 Nov 2018–17 Feb 2019
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Bibliography
Referenced in 7 publications
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Renée Free, Geoffrey Legge and Daniel Thomas AM, Tony Tuckson, Sydney, 1989, 109 (colour illus.) (plate 127), 184. cat.no. 62
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Renée Free, Geoffrey Legge and Daniel Thomas AM, Tony Tuckson, Sydney, 2006, 128 (colour illus.) (plate 139), 199-200.
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Terence Maloon and Tim Fisher, Painting forever: Tony Tuckson, Canberra, 2000, 45 (colour illus.), 61. cat.no. 47
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Denise Mimmocchi (Editor), Tony Tuckson, Sydney, 2018, 42, 66, 108-09 (colour illus.), 208, 223.
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Daniel Thomas AM, Tony Tuckson 1921-1973, Sydney, 1976, 29, 44 (illus.). cat.no. 67
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Gavin Wilson, Escape artists - modernists in the tropics, Cairns, 1998, 140, 142 (colour illus.).
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Frank’s flat: A selection from Frank Watters collection, Maitland, 2011, 27 (colour illus., detail), 33. cat.no. 213
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