H. J. JOHNSTONE Australian, 1835-1907

Estimate

30,000 - 40,000 AUD

bidding is closed

Description

Henry James Johnstone
OFF THE TRACK
Signed and dated 1881 lower right; bears artist's name, title and 'Purchased by the Trustees For the National Art Gallery NSW' on frame plaque
Oil on canvas
84 by 120 cm

Provenance

Purchased by the Trustees of the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, in Melbourne in 1883 for £105; de-accessioned by the Gallery in 1946

Australian Paintings, James R. Lawson, Sydney, 26 November 1946

Private collection, New South Wales

Exhibited

Believed to have been on loan in Newcastle during 1883

Country Loan Collections, Newcastle, 1899, cat. 41

The Artist and the Patron, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2 March - 1 May 1988, not included in catalogue

On loan to the Art Gallery of New South Wales, hung with the permanent collection, 1988-1989

Literature

In various Art Gallery of New South Wales collection display catalogues from 1883 until 1893

Catalogue Note

This poignant episode from pionering life was described in contemporary catalogues at the Art Gallery of New South Wales as 'a traveller, his horse fallen, on a lonely bush track, looking at the directional sign to a nearby station blazed on a large tree in the foreground'. Although nineteenth-century narrative paintings became unfashionable in the 1940s, H. J. Johnstone is now once again considered an important figure in Australian art. The younger Frederick McCubbin described him as 'quite a personality'; and he exhibited successfully in Syney and Melbourne before moving to America.