Bonhams 1793 : Ken Whisson (born 1927) Landscape Marks No. 10, 1992

Landscape Marks No. 10, 1992
signed, dated and inscribed 'Ken Whisson / "Land Marks No. 10" / 26/6/92 + 11/9/92' verso
synthetic polymer paint on canvas
100 x 119cm (39 3/8 x 46 7/8in).

Estimate:

AU$ 30,000 - 50,000
£19,000 - 32,000
US$ 29,000 - 48,000

Footnotes

PROVENANCE:
Purchased from Watters Gallery, Sydney in December 1999

EXHIBITED:
Ken Whisson Paintings, Watters Gallery, Sydney, 29 September - 16 October 1993, cat. no. 12
Paintings from the Laverty Collection, 1st hang at the Union Club, Sydney, 28 October 2003 - 20 September 2004
Laverty 2, Newcastle Regional Art Gallery, Newcastle, 14 May - 14 August 2011

In Landscape Marks no. 10 (1992) landscape elements are drawn with paint unlike the slab-like constructions of his earlier works on board and the scene is broken into multiple viewpoints ordered across the picture plane.

There is a bold clear geometry that is confidently laid down and the painting describes a various set of forms. It is no place in particular rather it is an imagined landscape where part of the picture seems to describe a series of buildings or architectural shapes whilst other components could stand for trees or bush. Although this work is a type of distillation of Whisson's own visual shorthand it is a shorthand that is 'under continual change and refinement.'

Glenn Barkley

1 Glenn Barkley and Lesley Harding Sometimes a Madhouse Sometimes a Palace: Thinking about the art of Ken Whisson in Ken Whisson: As If, Heide Museum of Modern Art, Melbourne and Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, p. 29.