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Lot 31

Sidney Nolan
(1917-1992)
Mask II, 1979

Important Australian Art

22 April 2021, 18:30 AEST

Melbourne, Armadale

Sold for AU$92,250 inc. premium

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Sidney Nolan (1917-1992)

Mask II, 1979
signed lower right: 'NOLAN'
signed dated and inscribed verso: 'MASK II 31-1-79 NOLAN'
oil on canvas
101.0 x 76.0cm (39 3/4 x 29 15/16in).

Footnotes

PROVENANCE
Rudy Komon Art Gallery, Sydney
Private collection, Sydney
Private collection, Melbourne

EXHIBITED
Sidney Nolan, Rudy Komon Art Gallery, Sydney, 1 – 22 March 1980, cat. 20
Sir Sidney Nolan: 3. Exhibitions at the 1982 Festival of Perth: 'Kangaroo' 'Ern Malley' and 'For the Term of His Natural Life', Art Gallery of Western Australia and University of Western Australia, Perth, February 1982, cat. 14

Sidney Nolan's anonymous portraits of Ned Kelly are paramount to the artist's legacy. Across six decades his continued fascination with Kelly was a driving force, creating numerous series' in all mediums dedicated to the enigmatic bushranger.

To mark the 100 year anniversary since Ned Kelly's death in 1880, Nolan embarked on a series of ten portraits of the Kelly mask which were exhibited with Rudy Komon in 1980. Painting the series in late 1979 the portrait scaled 'masks' show Nolan's typical handling of Kelly's iconic square helmet. Whilst the helmet motif is immediately recognisable as Ned Kelly, the face behind the mask is never evident. The theme of disguise continues within the series each work offering their own individuality by the way of a different composition framed within the helmet itself as if referencing events of the Kelly story.

The present work, dated 31st December 1979, may perhaps be one of a small group of works in which Nolan exposes Kelly's face within the helmet. Another work in the series executed the following day reveals Kelly about to be hung, whilst an earlier work in true Nolan ambiguity shows the middle composition as a group of abstracted faces looking over a cup and saucer. Painting the series in limited shades of colour, Nolan's Mask series is a bold, triumphant graphic statement.

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