Leski Auctions
The Art of Constant Rearrangement - 477 lots
The Art of Constant Rearrangement
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Auction House:
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Reference:#A441
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Description:The Joshua McClelland Print Room & Rathdowne Galleries
The Joshua McClelland Print Room came to life when our father opened a small gallery in Little Collins Street, Melbourne, in 1927. When he died in 1956 our mother, Joan, took over the business. A few years later, our mother heard rumours that “the trade” had given her six months before folding. The gallery survived – and sometimes prospered – for another sixty-two years, so there must have been something in the Joshua McClelland Print Room’s particular art of constant re-arrangement that made it the longest surviving, continuously functioning gallery in Melbourne and probably Australia. Our mother died in late 2017 at the age of 104 and we decided, in the wake of that loss, that we would begin the difficult task of closing down. This catalogue and auction, containing some very early acquisitions and some of our very recent ones, will be the final chapter and, we hope, a lasting remembrance of our late parents and the roles they played in the cultural life of the city.
Our father had grown up in Flinders Street, in a large old house where the Herald and Weekly Times offices were later built. He, and his younger brother, were thrown out of the house for raffish behavior – racing their horses along Swanston Street! He was obviously a spirited young man, a fine combination of rebel and aesthete and it would appear that the Melbourne of the period, the early ‘20s, suited his temperament.
His first venture, The Little Gallery, was opened in 1927 in Little Collins Street, behind Georges Department Store. Then, in the early ‘30s he moved to an upstairs room further down Little Collins Street. He told us it was hugely popular with his friends in winter as it had an open fireplace and it became something of a gathering place for artists and dealers. Our father’s interests at that time were antiquarian. The first exhibition was tantalizingly called “Rare Lithographs” and it was almost certainly predominantly English and topographical images.
In 1936, the year our parents married, the gallery moved to 79 Collins Street, a long, narrow, street-level shop, very light and with a beautiful façade, where furniture, silver, porcelain and paintings were offered. Next door, at 81, was the downstairs print gallery and the storeroom. No.79 turned out to be a very convenient drop-in spot for the Collins Street doctors and other inhabitants of that part of town, and many of them became collectors and long-term clients. One could park right outside and there were various popular lunch places nearby, not to mention the Oriental and Occidental hotels. Among the frequent visitors, the director of the National Gallery of Victoria, Daryl Lindsay, would drop in to discuss a new acquisition.
In those days, what was to become the print room was used for special exhibitions. Then, in the early 1950s, when the bank needed to take over the premises, our father decided to sell up the antique furniture side of the business and concentrate on using the basement as a permanent gallery.
Why did he call it The Print Room? We never really asked him that question, but certainly, in the 1940s and ‘50s, there was a climate of great respect for the print. There was the fabulous print room at the NGV supervised by Ursula Hoff and it was a highlight of a fine arts course to have tutorials in the print room and pour over the William Blakes. The Australian Painters & Etchers Society, established in the 1920s, was at it’s peak and many collectors who bought from our gallery would include sharing their latest additions to their print cabinets with dinner guests. And it was during these years that a greater appreciation of early Australian historical maps and prints was becoming evident. Among the artists exhibited at The Print Room in the 1940s and ‘50s were Lionel Lindsay, John Shirlow, Sydney Long, Sydney Ure Smith, Penleigh Boyd, Napier Waller, Fred McCubbin and Arthur Boyd.
When our father died, in 1956, our mother decided to carry on the business with a focus on prints, paintings and Chinese porcelain, which, as she explained, seemed manageable. She was greatly helped in this by several collectors who generously traded pieces through the Print Room and from whom she learned a great deal. Several other timely events helped her in those early days of business in her own right. A great friend, Harry Tatlock Miller, had gone to London and was working with the Redfern Gallery and, with his assistance, mother arranged to have several exhibitions of French prints and posters, quite a radical departure in the otherwise artistically staid post-war environment of Melbourne.
However, as our mother said, “Against all this my real interest was in Australiana – the prints from the early Voyages and early topographical prints. There was a real interest in historical prints in the sixties, seventies and eighties. There was a period of pride and confidence in our history. There was a distinctly humanist element in the collectors of those days. They were deeply interested in the aboriginal inhabitants, the early voyages and contemporary science, especially the botanical and zoological depictions of Australia by the early artists.”
The Print Room stayed at Number 81 until 1979, when Conzinc Riotinto came to the rescue and gave our parents the front first floor of 105 Collins Street. The building was to be demolished “at some stage” so The Print Room and other “congenial tenants” were able to make use of a wonderful space which also came with free parking. And the rent was VERY reasonable! It was around this time that our mother started to exhibit a group of women printmakers. Her sympathy with them seems natural to us: she belonged, at least in spirit, to the same generation. She had an interest in international events and the printmakers she supported were experimenting with new subjects: sporting scenes, women at work, a jokey attitude to home and garden work. On the subject of historical prints, our mother had said “The Australian market is a wayward business with highs and lows, especially lows…..and I felt the need to encourage young printmakers to exhibit, which we did, with varying success.”
When 105 finally came to demolition, The Print Room moved to the second floor, 15 Collins Street. The premises included a large balcony overlooking Collins Street, which was great for exhibition openings.
It would be true to say that by this time at least half the business of the Print Room was in Asian art, including Chinese porcelain, Japanese lacquer and Japanese woodblock prints as well as South-East Asian textiles. Mother was one of the first Australian gallerists to visit China, beginning on the early 1970s. She made an annual pilgrimage to London and made frequent trips to Japan, Cambodia, Vietnam and Malaysia, always acquiring new items for the gallery. She rarely stood still.
Most recently, and with our mother having reached her hundredth birthday (and still working!) we moved the business to 310 Rathdowne Street, Carlton and it is from that lovely old building that we are finally saying goodbye as a gallery.
Can one still make a living in a print gallery? To quote from the title of a recent book on Margaret Preston, “The Art of Constant Rearrangement”, you need to be eclectic, flexible, willing to explore new avenues and carry other work.
To give mother the final words:
“It is probably true that we would not have survived if we had dealt only in prints. Every now and then an important painting, or a fine piece of Chinese porcelain would make a difference. Tom Robert’s Coming South, and Russell Drysdale’s Maria are two such works that saved the day.”
We thank all our clients and friends, past and present, for your support, encouragement and friendship and, on our parents’ behalf, we wish you many years of health and happiness enjoying the works of beauty and creativity with which you live and work.
Philippa Kelly, Patricia Williams and Joanna Lulofs -
Sale(s):05 May 2019 ~ 12noon (AEST)
727-729 High Street
Armadale, VIC 3143 Australia -
Viewing:02 May 2019 ~ 10am - 5pm
727-729 High Street
Armadale, VIC 3143
Australia
03 May 2019 ~ 10am - 5pm
727-729 High Street
Armadale, VIC 3143
Australia
04 May 2019 ~ 10am - 5pm
727-729 High Street
Armadale, VIC 3143
Australia
05 May 2019 ~ 9am - 11am
727-729 High Street
Armadale, VIC 3143
Australia
Prices realised in this sale include buyers premium of 21.450%.
