| Roy de Maistre Roy de Maistre, Australia 1894-1968 Berry's Bay, Sydney Harbour, 1920, Sydney oil on board, 24.0 x 33.0 cm Gift of Diana Ramsay AO through the Art Gallery of South Australia Foundation 2003 |
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| This lively harbour
landscape was painted in Sydney during the height of Roy de Maistre’s experimental
‘colour music’ period. Bordering on abstraction with its interlocked flattened
planes and simplified shapes, it shows a foreground track winding through vegetation, with
a distant outlook of the waterfront industry beyond. This elevated view from the North
Shore suburb of Berry’s Bay, where both de Maistre and his fellow artist friend
Roland Wakelin painted frequently, eloquently evokes the soft light and haze which so
often bathes Sydney Harbour. Roy de Maistre was an important Australian modernist painter in the first half of the twentieth century and is often credited with being the country’s first abstract painter. He was one of the earliest pioneers of post-impressionism and cubism in Sydney, and between the wars became preoccupied with investigating the connections between the colour spectrum and the musical scale. His early Sydney ‘colour music’ works from 1918 through to 1920 are often considered to be among his most interesting paintings. In 1930,finding Australia unresponsive to his modernist preoccupation, he left for London where he was to receive considerable acclaim as a British modernist for the rest of his life. Not only are de Maistre’s early ‘colour music’ paintings extremely rare, particularly beautiful examples, such as Berry’s Bay, Sydney Harbour, 1920, are difficult to procure. This major work has been purchased through the Art Gallery of South Australia Foundation with funds provided by one of the Gallery’s most generous donors, Diana Ramsay, AO. Berry’s Bay, Sydney Harbour is now on permanent display in gallery 4 along with other early examples of Sydney modernism. |
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