SIDNEY NOLAN Australian, 1917-1992

Collection of the Lord McAlpine of West Green (inscription on the reverse)

Private collection, Townsville

After his journey to Africa in the autumn of 1962 Nolan said, 'I feel there's a kind of painting to be done with animals and natural camouflage that would be in a sense a no-painting; there would be a total disappearance of the image - but if you stared at the painting long enough the image would eventually waft up'. He wanted to obtain a relation between the object and its environment of now-you-see-it-now-you-don't. He developed his penchant for the fluid dashing and diaphanous and sometimes gave an elusive permanence to transience even with an elephant lumbering across the grasslands. ¹

Nolan had a special affection and admiration for elephants, seeing in them great determination and a powerful instinct for survival. There are a number of elephant images in his African series of the early 1960s, in which a sense of ephemeral wonder – that ‘these animals have a special message for us in that they are unique’ – is evoked through his very technique. The image of the animal in its expansive, primordial setting is revealed in washes of oil paint over primed board, with details touched in with a more heavily loaded brush.


1. Introduction, The African Paintings, Marlborough Fine Art, London, 1963.