FREDERICK McCUBBIN

Private collection, Melbourne, thence by descent
Australian and International Paintings, Sculpture and Works on Paper, Deutscher-Menzies, Melbourne, 24 November 1999, lot 25
Private collection, Sydney

The Paintings of the Late Frederick McCubbin, The New Gallery, Melbourne, from 25 November 1924, cat. 46

Good condition - original John Thallon frame. UV inspecting reveals no retouching. Surface direct and deformation of support (canvas buckling slightly) especially over upper half.
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Frederick McCubbin's late paintings, as in Autumn landscape, are some of his best. Early figuration and narrative gave way to the beauty of colour and form at the disposal of a masterly technique. In late 1907, on his return from England, McCubbin and his large family moved to an old house at the end of Kensington Road, South Yarra. Much influenced by the painterly freedom of the late works of J. M. W. Turner, his own work underwent a change that resulted in some of the finest Impressionist landscapes ever painted in Australia. The single example of Golden sunlight , 1914, Dame Nellie Melba's gift to the Castlemaine Art Gallery and Historical Museum, will suffice. Autumn afternoon was painted at McCubbin's South Yarra home, the view being past the end of their old garden, in the paddock that then ran down to Como. The rustic appeal was such that they had many chooks and a cow, milked daily by son Louis to supply the family table.

Autumn landscape is a bravura performance, the broad overlaying strokes of the palette knife and brush almost dance across the picture surface, and colours sparkle in an atmosphere at once lively and enchanting. It is one of several memorable, late works that celebrate McCubbin's achievement. Others from 1916 include Autumn morning, South Yarra and landscape, South Yarra, both in the collection of the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne. While harkening back to those evocative oils of 1909 and 1910 in which the motif of a single tree also characterises the scene, it also reaches forward to his final great work, Yarra River from Kensington Road, South Yarra , 1917. In each, including Autumn afternoon, the backgrounds offer distant views of Richmond, Burnley, or east to South Yarra. McCubbin loved the spot, a feeling communicated in these paintings. Writing to his old friend Tom Roberts, he described it as 'the loveliest place I have ever lived in. A charming old colonial house of stone, cool on the hottest days, perched right over the Yarra with three acres of garden and trees.' ¹ The mood of the autumnal scene is reflective, in harmony with nature, perceptive, celebratory, transitory, and tinged with the biographical. McCubbin died a year later.

We are grateful to David Thomas for his assistance in cataloguing this work

1.Frederick McCubbin letter to Tom Roberts, December 1907, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney