Although titled The Glow, there is nothing diffuse about the paintings in this exhibition. Here, Quilty’s canvases act as the collision point of external and internal forces, confronting in their assessment of the current state of affairs. The exhibition features a series of portraits, many of which are self-portraits including a large-scale Rorschach painting, a visceral and self-reflective work where the artist takes on the guise of Santa. At once decisive and disorienting, multi-faceted and deconstructed, these works seek to comprehend the distortions in the wider world.
Portraiture is central to Quilty’s practice and his work has long been characterised by not only heavily laden canvases, but the weight of feeling that his paintings carry. As a counter-point to the canvases that are rich with impasto oil paint and colour, The Glow features two large scale charcoal works drawn directly onto linen, and a suite of small ink studies. These works highlight the immediacy that is synonymous with his approach to artmaking, instinctual and unapologetic.
“Painting is very personal. It’s all about confronting your own humanity […] there is so much to make work about and if we lived in an idyllic Utopian world, maybe then I will make beautiful paintings.” Ben Quilty
In 2019 the Art Gallery of South Australia presented the first major survey exhibition of Quilty’s work. Curated by Lisa Slade, the exhibition toured to the Art Gallery of NSW and QAGOMA. His work has been exhibited in a number of significant national and international exhibitions including ‘Dark Heart’ Adelaide Biennial of Australian Art, Art Gallery of South Australia (2014); ‘Painting. More Painting’ Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (2016); ‘Mad Love’ (A3), Berlin (2017), ‘NGV Triennial’ (2017) and the forthcoming Bangkok Art Biennale (2022-23).
Quilty won the Archibald Prize in 2011 and the Doug Moran National Portrait Prize in 2009. In 2011 Quilty travelled to Afghanistan as an official war artist with The Australian War Memorial. His work is represented in numerous public collections including the National Gallery of Australia, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Art Gallery of South Australia, National Gallery of Victoria and QAGOMA.
Image: Ben Quilty, Santa, self portrait rorschach, 2022, oil on linen, 202.0 x 265.0 cm
