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Lot 151
John Olsen(born 1928)Improvisation on an Octopus, 1990
Amended
21 March 2021, 14:00 AEDT
Melbourne, ArmadaleSold for AU$59,040 inc. premium
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Merryn Schriever
Managing Director, Australia
John Olsen (born 1928)
Improvisation on an Octopus, 1990
titled, signed and dated lower right: 'Improvisation on / an Octopus / John Olsen 90'
pastel and watercolour on paper
99.0 x 99.5cm (39 x 39 3/16in).
titled, signed and dated lower right: 'Improvisation on / an Octopus / John Olsen 90'
pastel and watercolour on paper
99.0 x 99.5cm (39 x 39 3/16in).
Footnotes
PROVENANCE
The Lucio's Collection, Sydney
To begin. First there was a restaurant and its name was The Hungry Horse, and when the horse grew up it became a famous art gallery as well. On a fragile cast-iron balcony of the art gallery, artists perilously perched and looked down on the sacred site which is the corner of Windsor and Elizabeth streets, Paddington. Suddenly the horse bolted and became the most famous restaurant of all, Lucio's Italian Restaurant.
Perhaps it didn't quite happen that way, but as the years winked by that's how it seemed to me.
The new owners were Lucio Galletto and Marino Maioli, fresh with new ideas about Italian food. On reflection it could have been called cucina sana, but that sounds too fussy, for it seems to put a limitation on its intention. For it looked to quality and freshness of ingredients, where the ingredients maintain their individuality within the enormous vocabulary of Italian recipes, and the tradition remains secure.
There were freshly made pasta, large and different-shaped ravioli stuffed with crabs, prawns and spinach, in what seemed to be endless combinations, served with discrete and unctuous sauces.
Constant travellers told me that Lucio's Tagliolini alla Granseola (green pasta with blue swimmer crab) is as good as, if not better than, any they have tasted in Italy.
There is a dish, it could be called a signature dish, for which freshness is so paramount that it must be ordered the day before. It is Pesce al Sale. Lucio uses snapper. Only Lucio serves this, presented whole and covered in a salt cast, at a table next to you. The silence and anticipation are religious. Lucio lifts the cast whole, and the aroma which arises from the concealed fish is something to dream about. Then the maestro slices the flaky but juicy fish into portions. Still all remains in silence. With an artist's sense of abstraction, Lucio judiciously drizzles the finest virgin olive oil over the portions, adding a squeeze of lemon juice, a pinch of parsley, a turn of black pepper and tiny chopped, seeded tomatoes.
Ecco - it is done!, Spontaneously everyone claps; how's that for a one-man exhibition?
Simple? Not at all. When the salt emulsion that covers the fish is put into the oven it may not be touched or prodded. The salt cast must be mixed to the right consistency, else all will be a disaster. The snapper must be removed at exactly the right moment.
From the beginning the restaurant was a success. Everyone intimated that something good was happening. For artists something special was at hand. Lucio and Marino loved art and artists (artists delight in being patted) and pictures were brought - some in lieu of dinners, some as simple gifts to a gifted and generous restaurateur.
This book is a salute to this modest but great restaurant that shares moments of happiness and will remain in the corner of our hearts.
John Olsen, 1999
The Art of Food at Lucio's
Saleroom notices
Please note additional exhibition history:
Exhibited
John Olsen 1991, Australian Galleries, Melbourne, 5 – 23 March 1991, cat. 17