RUPERT BUNNY

On Rupert Bunny's return to Paris after his triumphant visit to Australia in 1911, his art took two very different paths – the brilliantly colourful and rhythmic mythological decorations of such works as The Rape of Persephone, c.1913 in the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, and elegant women relaxed in intimate garden settings, bathed in gentle evocations of dappled sunlight. The Garden Seat is a characteristic example of the latter, with all those subtle nuances and motifs that have endeared many collectors to this period of his art. It shows the artist's wife, Jeanne Heloise, seated, reading a book under the shade of her parasol, while her lady companion stands nearby holding a large fan, both dressed in those long, flouncy gowns that Bunny so loved to paint. In these lyrical explorations of the poetry to be found in the everyday, he engaged the subtlest harmonies of colour in a softly impressionistic style, to display his mastery of figure composition and feminine charm, of the play of light on figure and dress. The Garden Seat belongs to a distinguished group of paintings in prominent private and public collections, including A Sunny Noon in the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, A Sunny Day in the Howard Hinton Collection of the New England Regional Art Museum, and The Sun Bath in the Bendigo Art Gallery, all painted in about 1913. Together, they offer a last flowering of la belle époque before all was swept away by the Great War.  

Sir Keith Murdoch, Melbourne
The Keith Murdoch Collection of Antiques, Leo Crosthwaite and Co. Auctioneer, Melbourne, 11-13 March 1953, lot 267
Mr R. L. Bills, Melbourne; thence by descent until
Gould Galleries, Melbourne
Private collection, Melbourne; purchased from the above in 1995

From Bunny to Boyd: A Selection of Australian Art, Gould Galleries, Melbourne, 17 March - 15 April 1995, cat. 1

David Thomas, Rupert Bunny, Lansdowne Press, Melbourne, 1970, cat. 0152

On Rupert Bunny's return to Paris after his triumphant visit to Australia in 1911, his art took two very different paths - the brilliantly colourful and rhythmic mythological decorations of such works as The Rape of Persephone c.1913 in the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, and elegant women relaxed in intimate garden settings, bathed in gentle evocations of dappled sunlight. The Garden Seat is a characteristic example of the latter, with all those subtle nuances and motifs that have endeared many collectors to this period of his art. It shows the artist's wife, Jeanne-Heloise, seated, reading a book under the shade of her parasol, while her lady companion stands nearby holding a large fan, both dressed in those long, flouncy gowns that Bunny so loved to paint. In these lyrical explorations of the poetry to be found in the everyday, he engaged the subtlest harmonies of colour in a softly, impressionistic style, to display his mastery of figure composition and feminine charm, of the play of light on figure and dress. The Garden Seat belongs to a distinguished group of paintings in prominent private and public collections, including A Sunny Noon in the National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, A Sunny Day in the Howard Hinton collection of the New England Regional Art Museum, and The Sun Bath in the Bendigo Art Gallery, all painted in about 1913. Together, they offer a last flowering of la belle époque before all was swept away by the Great War.