Art Gallery of NSW rights an historical wrong with exhibition tribute to John Russell of Belle-Ile
A new exhibition at the Art Gallery of NSW seeks to give a forgotten Australian painter — a friend of Van Gogh and Monet — the status he deserves.
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IT’S the very first painting encountered by the 2.3 million visitors who annually flock to the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. It’s a portrait of Vincent van Gogh, but it wasn’t painted by the artist universally known for his tragic life story.
The painting was actually done by John Russell, a Sydney-born artist of huge talent who fostered long and warm friendships with some of the most famous artists of the modern era.
Van Gogh was one of these friends. Others were Claude Monet, Henri Matisse and Auguste Rodin, people who can only be described as giants of modern painting and sculpture.
All these artists returned Russell’s regard. He was not only amiable and generous, but was passionately devoted to his own art.
The consensus is that Russell should by now be a famous artist like another of his friends, the Australian painter Tom Roberts. Russell’s talent was immense, even by international standards. And inherited wealth freed him from the necessity to earn a living.
But Russell’s decision to quit Sydney for Europe in 1880 would see his name relegated to a mere footnote until the 1960s when collectors began to discover and appreciate his work.
Australian art historians did not include him in their writings because he lived most of his life abroad and was off their radar. But in France, he was not well known either. For 20 years he lived on a remote island off the coast of Brittany, thus curtailing his opportunities to exhibit the work that the likes of Van Gogh admired so greatly.
So when Russell returned to Australia in 1924 and settled in a home on the waterfront at Watsons Bay, no one here realised just how fascinating a part he had played in the course of modern European art, or that he was himself a brilliant painter.
That will surely change when a retrospective exhibition entitled John Russell: Australia’s French Impressionist opens on July 21 at the Art Gallery of NSW.
Curator Wayne Tunnicliffe tracked down Russell’s artworks from private collectors. He also borrowed from public collections such as the Musee d’Orsay in Paris and the Musee de Morlaix in Brittany. The Morlaix has a large holding of Russells because of its proximity to Belle-Ile-en-Mer, the island where Russell built a house above the windswept clifftops and where he lived with his wife and children for 20 years from 1888.
Tunnicliffe has twice journeyed to Bell-Ile to see the scudding clouds and “tumultuous ocean”.
“That’s what Russell pitted himself against for 20 years,” Tunnicliffe says.
Russell’s Belle-Ile paintings are certainly impressive. And it was on the island that he met Monet, who happened to be painting the cliffs there one day. The two men hit it off immediately, and had a long friendship.
When Matisse subsequently came to the island, Russell offered him hospitality too. Russell also passed on to Matisse the colour lessons that Monet had just taught him. In doing so, Russell played a pivotal role in the development of an astonishing career — Matisse went on to be one of the greatest colourists who ever lived.
Van Gogh never visited Belle-Ile, but the two had met in Paris when they studied together at the atelier of the famous Fernand Cormon in 1886.
That year, Russell and Van Gogh painted each other’s portraits, then exchanged them as gifts. Touchingly, the two portraits will be presented together in the AGNSW exhibition. Van Gogh was obviously attached to the portrait Russell had done of him. Years later, Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo: “Take good care of my portrait by Russell, which means a lot to me”.
The exhibition includes paintings Russell did in Sydney before and after his life in Europe, including a watercolour self portrait in a red fez that he painted in 1883. This picture was put in the cupboard of a country farm house over a century ago, and found quite recently by the descendants of the man to whom Russell had given the painting.
“(The exhibition) is the first time it’s ever been seen publicly,” Tunnicliffe said.
Russell is still remembered fondly on Belle-Ile, according to Sydney filmmaker Catherine Hunter whose films about the artist are on the AGNSW website.
Hunter and cinematographer Bruce Inglis went to Belle-Ile last year and met a woman called Madame Borgnis Desbordes whose great grandmother had been Russell’s seamstress. Madame Desbordes told Hunter that Russell had introduced tomatoes to the island and had built a charming manor house which was recently demolished to make way for an up-market hotel.
Madame Desbordes recalled playing in Russell’s home, which still existed when she was a child. By then, of course, Russell was long gone.
Russell and his beloved wife Marianna adored Belle-Ile. But when Marianna died aged 42 in 1908, Russell felt he could no longer stay there. He travelled widely, remarried, and eventually returned to Sydney where he died in 1930 at the age of 71.