GA039 | Australian & International Art

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CLIFTON PUGH (1924-1990)
Collecting Dead Wool 1957
oil and cement on composition board
signed and dated lower left: Clifton Pugh APR 57
124.5 x 73cm
PROVENANCE
Bonython Art Gallery, Adelaide
Elder Smith Goldsbrough Mort Limited, 1 October 1968;
transferred to Elders IXL in 1985 Portrait of Australia
Collection, Foster's Group Limited (label verso)
Sotheby's, Melbourne, The Foster's Collection of Australian
Art, 23 May 2005, Lot 35
Corporate collection, Melbourne
EXHIBITED
Clifton Pugh, Macquarie Galleries, Sydney,
November 1957, cat. 11
Clifton Pugh, Bonython Art Gallery, Adelaide
Elders IXL Collection: Masterworks of Australian Painting
and French Barbizon School, Colonial, Contemporary,
Continental, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide,
2 March - 1 April 1984, cat. 55, illus.
Portrait of Australia 1830-1930: The Elders IXL Collection,
Riddoch Art Gallery, Mount Gambier, SA, 25 April - 1 June
1986; Mildura Arts Centre, Mildura, Vic., illus. and further
venues in later years, cat. 45, illus.
The Sheep Show: Colonial to Contemporary interpretations
of the Sheep in Art, Ararat Gallery, Ararat, Vic.,
26 October - 2 December 1990.
LITERATURE
Noel Macainsh, Clifton Pugh, Georgian House,
Melbourne, 1962, illus. pl. 11
Kym Bonython, Modern Australian Painting 1950 - 1975,
Rigby, Adelaide, rev. edn 1980, illus., p. 24
Traudi Allen, Clifton Pugh, Patterns of a Lifetime,
Nelson, Melbourne, 1981, p. 46
Ron Radford, Elders IXL Collection: Masterworks of
Australian Painting and French Barbizon School, Colonial,
Contemporary, Continental, Art Gallery of South Australia,
Adelaide, 1984, p. 53, cat. 55, illus.
Ron Radford, Pamela Luhrs et al., Portrait of Australia,
Elders IXL Collection, Elders IXL, Melbourne, 1986,
pp. 68-69, illus. pl. 45
$20,000–30,000
Clifton Pugh was an avid environmentalist known for his
hard-edged gaze on rural Australia; his paintings were both
commentary and a call to action. Pugh grew up in the city
and after a brief service in the military, he purchased a plot
of land in Cottles Bridge, Victoria. In tandem with his art
practice, Pugh dedicated most of his years to developing
the surrounding area of his Cottles Bridge home, restoring
the natural ecosystem derailed by agriculture and invasive
flora and fauna. Located on the rural fringe of developing
Melbourne, it was close enough to entice city-dwelling
artists to immerse themselves in the rugged bush
landscape. Pugh’s property soon became a mainstay for the
likes of John Olsen, Fred Williams and John Perceval.
Dead Wool, 1957 was considered by the artist to be a
cornerstone piece in his body of work. He casts a thoughtful
counterpoint to Tom Roberts’ iconic painting Shearing the
Rams, 1890, in which the shearers are championed in the
Australian psyche as hard-working, boisterous larrikins.
Pugh’s iconoclastic painting reveals an unsentimental
facsimile of masculine labour. His focus was much more
on geographical actuality as opposed to the nationalist
view of his predecessors. It held a mirror to the depression
and desperation facing rural livelihood - men and youths
would scavenge wool from rotting sheep carcases for
cash. It was grim and cheerless resourcefulness for those
rugged countrymen down on their luck. The figure stoically
contends with the crows who've claimed the flesh for
themselves. ‘Much of Pugh’s work is the outcome of a
deeply held belief in the interdependence of life — plant,
animal and human. He has been inspired throughout by
a spiritual affinity with the Australian desert landscape;
at times he has used the battle for survival there in
metaphorical ways…’ 1 Dead Wool is a testament to the
harsh duality of existence for man and beast in 1950s rural
Australia.
Well documented and widely exhibited, this work is an iconic
example of Clifton Pugh’s ability to draw on the depth and
complexity of the Australian bush where ‘the landscape is
moulding into sharp patterns from a chaos of grass, rocks,
trees, and his stylised animals and birds provide a dramatic
counterpart.’ 2 In composition, texture and colour palette this
work is punchy and provocative, his intuitive ability to witness
and contexualise our coexistence with nature is what makes
Clifton Pugh’s work so exceptional.
Sarah Garrecht
1. Rosemary Crumlin, Images of Religion in Australian Art, Kensington,
NSW, Bay Books, 1988, p.92
2. The Australian Painters 1964-1966: Contemporary Australian
Painting from the Mertz Collection, 1967, p. 19