FRED WILLIAMS Australian, 1927-1982

Collection of the artist

Collection of Mrs Lyn Williams, inventory no. LW823

Private collection, New South Wales; purchased from Rex Irwin Art Dealer, Sydney, 2000

Private collection, Sydney

Fred Williams, a Retrospective, Australian National Gallery, Canberra and tour to state galleries, 1987-88, cat. 151

Fred Williams, Major Paintings and Etchings from the Estate of the Artist, Rex Irwin Art Dealer, Sydney, 16 May - 10 June 2000

Williams found this painting spot at Wollert, about twenty kilometres north of Melbourne, on an excursion while working on his well-known ‘Kew Billabong’ series in April and May of 1975.

The beautiful painting, with its lacy tracery of grasses and water plants and reflections, captures the scene just as Williams described it in his painting diary: ‘There is less water… – but quite fascinating with its covering of yellow-green… [I] work very freely indeed’. ¹ Explosions of colour and phosphorescence on the surface are brilliantly set against indigo depth. Like Claude Monet painting at Giverny, Williams here deliberately circumscribed his view of the landscape to its intimately understood essence of colour, texture and atmosphere. In the words of Patrick McCaughey, ‘The closer Williams drew towards Monet’s fiery music, the more he was able to bring his own feelings to the fore’. ²

Williams retained Pond at Wollert II in his own collection and it was first exhibited in the national touring retrospective exhibition of his work in 1987-88. We are most grateful to Mrs Lyn Williams for assistance in its cataloguing.


1.  7 May 1975, in Mollison, J., A Singular Vision: The Art of Fred Williams, Australian National Gallery, Canberra and Oxford University Press, Melbourne, 1989, p. 203.
2.  Fred Williams 1927-1982, Murdoch Books, Sydney, rev. edn 1996, p. 286.