Never before him had the Tate bought such a young living artist's work.
Before his work The Olgas for Ernest Giles (1985) was sold, the highest record for Australian art auctions at the time was not yet $3.48 million.
Before him, the writer Clive James had not written any Australian artist into his book as a character in his work.
Brett Whiteley is one of the most successful artists who have stood out from Australia. Prolific, with works straddling the boundaries between figuration and abstraction, and emotional and experimental, are characteristic of his work, but he believes that drugs and alcohol unleash his creativity, which allows him to paint such vivid works. But looking at his life experience, maybe it's just an excuse for his heavy dependence on drugs and alcohol.
Not everyone 7 years old can win in a painting competition held by the Royal Family
Brett Whiteley was born in 1939 in Langeville, a port town in New South Wales, Australia. Founded by French immigrants in the 1880s and named after the French aristocrat Langeville, this small seaside town has harbors, river valleys, woods and villages, and whiteley has felt the charm of nature since childhood. And this living environment also influenced his later creations.
Langeville Harbour
When Whiteley was 7 years old, he participated in an annual art competition exhibition organised by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, "The Driver Rests in the Shade of a Tree, But What About His Horse?" " is the title of the work that Bright sent for the award, and he won the prize in this painting competition for this work. It was also from this time that Bright's keen observation of the surrounding environment and his creative expression began to appear.
Not everyone succeeds in the walk between abstraction and figuration
He was then sent to a boarding school, a period when the work of many of the great artists, such as Vincent van Gogh, aroused his great passion for art, and Whiteley wanted to find out what kind of talent these masters were so different.
Sofala,1956
From 1956, when Whiteley worked at an advertising agency to make a living, he created many oil paintings with figurative characteristics. During this time he also studied painting at the night school of Julian Ashton School.
The Italian Asian painter William Pidgeon, after seeing Brett's work, greatly appreciated it and encouraged him to select scholarships funded by the Italian government. In 1960 he was awarded a scholarship to Italy, and the influence of Abstract Expressionism began.
Red Anonymous Painting
In 1961, Whiteley moved to London, the same year that the Tate bought the painting, now titled Red Anonymous (1960).
Between 1960 and 1963, Whiteley worked for about three years, and his abstract paintings matured, but when they were recognized by many galleries, he chose to return to figuration. Although there are many artists in the history of modern art who have wandered between abstraction and figuration, there are very few who have succeeded like him.
My armchair
My Armchair, created in 1976, fetched a high price of $3.92 million, setting a record for an Australian oil painting auction.
The art historian and whiter's former friend, Sandra McGrath, in his book Brett Whiteley, about his deeds and artistic creation, tried to explain the reason for his transformation:
Whiteley's decision has a long-standing foundation: he combines life with a variety of scenes, emotional fluctuations, and historical emphasis. His work reflects the experience of life, which ranges from elusive, dramatic and longing surrealist images to an intense poetic intimate space in which objects, places, and people are elevated by his personal aesthetic and possessing lasting magic because of his imagination. ”
Woman in bath,1963
Indeed, many of Brett's works reflect a variety of scenes, emotional fluctuations, and historical events in life. In 1964, when serial killer John Christie committed a crime in west London, where Whiteley lived, dark themes appeared in his series of paintings. In 1967, Whiteley was given the opportunity to study and work in New York. After that, he began to create a masterpiece using a variety of wooden drawing boards, and enriched the texture of the picture with photographs, fiberglass and other collage forms.
Chelsea Flower Show
During those turbulent times, he was also deeply influenced by the opposition to the Vietnam War (1954-1975). After a year at Mount Fuji, Whiteley returned to Australia in 1969, during which time he created works such as Listen to Nature, which were heavily painted and carried with a frenzied mood.
Not everyone can win two Achebel Awards, two Winnie Awards and two Suman Awards
By the 1970s, Whiteley's work was more frankly celebrating the australian landscape. Also for his work from this period, Whiteley was twice awarded the Achebel Prize, one of Australia's most popular and prestigious arts awards, the Winney Prize, which twice awarded the best landscape or sculpture in Australian landscapes, and twice the Suman Award for the finest thematic paintings, genre paintings, or murals created in oil paintings, acrylic, watercolor paints, or mixed media.
Big Orange (sunset)
Big Orange (Sunset) (1974) depicts a large area of bright woods, in which colorful floats and dots of color bring the whole picture to life. What inspired him to create this warm painting was made of fiberglass filaments, accompanied by Whiteley's favorite dark blue tone, Palm Tree (Independent Dark Blue)...
But these paintings, with their lively colours and line designs, came to an abrupt end in 1992, when Brett Whiteley died of heroin overdose at a motel in New South Wales. The "most successful young Australian exile of all time" has since remained in the memoirs of writer Clive James.