Sydney is not a city for wandering
Sydney’s CBD is full of bland glass and concrete towers. Melbourne, in contrast, seems to have preserved, with its Victorian urban fabric, a certain Dickensian squalor.
Christopher Allen
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Does fabric stretch the rules of a painting prize?
Is Julia Gutman’s winning portrait of singer Montaigne really a painting and therefore eligible for the Archibald Prize?
In what sense was Australia designed?
The planning of ideal states can be an intellectual exercise – the imagination of utopia – or a political project, but no artificially designed nation has ever been successfully realised.
The Little Prince: the shortest great book of the 20th century
The story of a boy who is discouraged from using his imagination in favour of ‘sensible’ pursuits is still a powerful lesson.
Burlesque jesters back in the frame
The handful of competent paintings in the Archibald Prize are merely foils to the spectacle of excess, exaggeration and identity fetishism.
![‘Queen of the Night’ relief painted clay Iraq, about 1750 BCE purchased with support from The National Lottery Heritage Fund, Art Fund and the Wolfson Foundation, British Museum Friends, Sir Joseph Hotung and the Seven Pillars of Wisdom Trust 2003,0718.1 © Trustees of the British Museum, 2022 [short caption/credit] ‘Queen of the Night’ relief, Iraq, about 1750 BCE. © Trustees of the British Museum, 2022 [media credit line] © Trustees of the British Museum, 2022. All rights reserved.](https://content.api.news/v3/images/bin/07a2e9ea51ece45ed355b3125c5f4d08?width=650)
Feminine power has endured through history
An exhibition delves into nurture, destruction and the femininepower of spiritual beings through the ages.
Art institutions in crisis: the NGA is just the tip of the iceberg
Galleries are largely staffed by a sub-intellectual class, who know little about art and are visibly more concerned with ideological self-positioning. We should not be content to leave our organs of collective memory to them.
‘Background painting’ no excuse for Indigenous art fixing
Evidence collected by The Australian raises serious questions about the artwork coming out of the APY Lands. It’s even more concerning because the APYACC and its director make such a point of ethics.
Scandal paints National Gallery into a corner
Allegations about dubious practices in the APY collective are disastrous for the National Gallery.
A matrix of meaning
Understanding the wordplay accompanying Peter Tyndall’s works in this retrospective is key to appreciating the artist’s philosophy.
Original URL: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/author/christopher-allen/page/10