Super fund Cbus to sell its Australian art collection

Works by Sidney Nolan, Margaret Preston and Brett Whiteley will go under the hammer when Cbus sells its collection of Australian art.

Eliza Burton, of Deutscher and Hackett, with the portrait of Joseph Brown by Brian Dunlop being auctioned by super fund Cbus. Picture: Aaron Francis

In the late 1980s, art experts Joseph Brown and Bernard Smith made a call on the ACTU and managed to convince a building union superannuation fund that it should invest in Australian art.

The Cbus Collection of Australian Art, as it came to be known, started with an investment of $2m and now includes about 300 works by many well-known names, including Arthur Boyd, Emily Kngwarreye, Margaret Preston, Brett Whiteley and Fred Williams. The super fund is about to see the return on its investment, as the collection will go under the hammer in four sales at Deutscher and Hackett starting in July.

Detail from Sidney Nolan’s painting Crossing the River, part of the Cbus Collection of Australian Art

The Cbus collection was started in the era of big corporate collections and trophy paintings bought by the likes of Robert Holmes a Court and Alan Bond.

“Cbus became pretty much the only corporate collection that kept going with some determination,” said Chris Deutscher, executive director of Deutscher and Hackett.

“It was an attempt by Joseph Brown to put together an encyclopedic collection of Australian art.” While Mr Deutscher said the sale could exceed $9m, Brett Chatfield, Cbus deputy chief investment officer, said the fund did not speculate on returns.

He said the sale was part of the fund’s ongoing management of its asset portfolio on behalf of its members.

The collection was not hidden in a boardroom but was managed by Latrobe Regional Gallery, which made the pictures available for exhibitions and loans.

The sale will include a small Jeffrey Smart painting, Study for Man with Bouquet, estimated at $120,000-$180,000, and Margaret Preston’s Coastal Gums, $180,000-$240,000.

Margaret Preston, Coastal Gums, 1929. Cbus Collection of Australian Art

Other artists in the sale include colonial painters Eugene Von Guerard and William Piguenit, and Australian impressionists Arthur Streeton, Tom Roberts and Frederick McCubbin.

Joseph Brown, a Polish migrant, art dealer and collector who donated his personal collection to the National Gallery of Victoria in 2004, is represented in the Cbus collection with a portrait of him by Brian Dunlop.

While the Commonwealth Bank, Macquarie Bank and Wesfarmers have art collections, other corporations have deaccessioned theirs in recent years. In February, Deutscher and Hackett handled the sale of the NAB collection, realising $10.5m.

Mr Hackett said there was keen interest from private collectors and investors in fine art.

“More than ever it is acknowledged as an asset class,” he said.

“In the 90s, maybe a dozen people were capable of buying big paintings. Now, there are hundreds of people, and always someone entering the market you’ve never heard of.”