Footnotes

PROVENANCE
Metro 5 Gallery, Melbourne
Private collection, Melbourne

EXHIBITED
The Metro 5 Art Prize, Metro 5 Gallery, Melbourne, February 2003

LITERATURE
Mark Skulley, 'Prize winner learns gentle art of media handling', The Australian Financial Review, Melbourne, 6 February 2003, p. 7
John Mangan, 'A family affair wins $40,000 for young Melbourne Artist', The Age, Melbourne, 6 February 2003
Jeff Makin, 'Youthful Triumph', The Herald Sun, Melbourne, 10 February 2003, p. 72


'Quilty's paintings encompass more than subject matter to include the application of the paint itself. He employs broad gestural strokes, trowelled on to block out the broad masses. The chunky brushstrokes tell of energy and activity, marking a trail of aesthetic decisions determining colour and form, while acting as a building block for constructing likeness. Quilty's exuberant paintwork is held in check by contour and tone, which describe salient features of each subject. The very physicality of the impasto paint plays a significant role in the recognition of the painting as an object and, simultaneously, as a constructed image. Quilty's paintings play out an alternating focus from image to painterly topography. He negotiates representation from the resistant, sensual materiality of the paint medium and the conventional desire for a recognizable image.'1

Flinders Street was painted in 2002 the same year he won the prestigious Brett Whiteley travelling scholarship for his painting Elwood Park. The present work was the unofficial runner up in the inaugural Metro 5 Art Prize in 2003 which was set up as barometer for Australian painters aged under 35. The following year, Quilty would go on to win the same prize in 2004 with a painting of his 1972 Holden Torana further strengthening his reputation within the contemporary art scene.

1. Michael Desmond, Pride and Patriotism, March , 2007, Grantpirrie, Sydney (exh. cat.)