The Art Gallery of NSW is a fascinating place.
It seems to meander on endlessly, floor after floor, each filled with a different genre of art.
We took Mum there recently to view the Tang Exhibition, a collection of artifacts from the Chinese Tang Empire (618 – 907AD). Ignoring my suggestion that we start with lunch at the cafe, Mum took us to the very fancy Chiswick restaurant inside the gallery. The food was very good and after lunch, they brought us this elegant Queen Anne bone china plate with four pieces of excellent dark chocolate (made in-house no less – I was impressed!)…
The Tang Exhibition is spread out over two floors and includes some audio-visual and virtual reality components. It would definitely appeal to a fan of antiquities…
This statue made me laugh – I loved her round moon face. She would have fit right in with our family…
The lower floor had mostly Buddhist artifacts, including this large statue of the Medicine Buddha from the late 700s or 800s…
We left Mum admiring the ancient treasures and went off to explore the rest of the gallery.
. . . . .
I know I bang on about this a lot, but it never fails to amaze me that we Sydneysiders can view so much magnificent art for free! Like Brett Whiteley’s extraordinary, wall-filling, The Balcony (1975)…
…and Claude Monet’s Port-Goulphar, Belle Île (1887)…
One of the lower floors houses the John Kaldor Family Collection, comprising over 200 international contemporary art pieces recently gifted to the gallery. You can view photos of them all here. Two artworks by Swiss artist Ugo Rondinone caught my eye…
Clockwork for Oracles (2011) is a site specific installation of 52 “windows”…
…and If There Were Anywhere But Dessert. Wednesday (2000)…this one scared me silly. I was concerned that it might be performance art and that the clown was going to leap up at me when I walked in. It turned out to be a very convincing fibreglass model…
Finally, my favourite landscape in the whole gallery (and apparently everyone else’s too) – Spring Frost (1919) by NZ-born Australian Ellioth Gruner. It’s an unbelievably beautiful work, painted largely in situ at Emu Plains. At a time before computers and high quality photos, the artist sat outdoors with his legs wrapped in hessian bags to prevent frostbite while painting this masterpiece…
It was as if sunlight was shining out of the painting…I stared at it until Pete finally dragged me away…
If you haven’t explored the Art Gallery of NSW before, it’s definitely worth a visit!
Fig Jam and Lime Cordial 
Spring frost is my favorite too. A beautiful painting.
Oh, how lucky you are! For a small state, Maine has many good art museums, but of course it can’t compare with a big city’s offerings. And for free!
That clown would have scared the bejesus out of me too. Thanks for sharing the gallery pictures – beautiful. I particularly liked the ‘windows’.
What a wonderful group of museums! Maybe I can get more by going on line to the site. Thanks.
When I come to syddie one day – we will walk through together – wouldn’t that be grand – I love the cows.
Oh I do love the cows Sydney is wonderful place to visit…love the plate too.Robyn
The cows are one of my favourite landscape too – I look at it every time I go to the gallery when I’m back in Sydney. Have a postcard of it on my bookshelf here in the US.
I love Tang Dynsasty art- and all things Tang Dynasty. I hope the exhibition comes down to Melbourne. The painting Spring Frost was on everyone’s mother’s wall in the 60s. Beautiful flashback
It is great to be a tourist in your own city, fining all the free treasures.
My daughter and I spent last week wandering through the Art Gallery after we saw Frida’s exhibition. So many glorious artworks there. I didn’t see the clown though ( and I am quite glad I didn’t, it looks quite scary!) Funny how you like the ‘cows’ painting, that was my reaction to it too! I then took her to see Hossein Valamanesh’s Char Soo after reading about it on your blog. She quite enjoyed it. This week I’m taking her the the White Rabbit gallery in Chippendale for more civilised browsing. We are very fortunate indeed to have such access to many wonderful things in our beautiful city. Thank you for sharing and have a wonderful week.
Thank you Celia – have not been for a few years and am thrilled to see your photos. Would love to see the Tang Exhibit and the new Kaldor Family donation . . . but would find time for certain to visit my favourite Heidelberg artists and just quietly sit amongst the beauty created in reasonably ‘recent’ yesteryear . . .
The cows are just gorgeous and as you said the light is perfect ,love the plate the chocolate came on .sounds like a wonderful day Sydney has some treasures doesn’t she.?
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Spring Frost is absolutely radiant. I’m not sure that I would have gone anywhere near that clown!
You are lucky indeed to have all of this for free.
Spring Frost is such a gorgeous work! And love the look of that dark chocolate made in house, how extravagant!
Yes, I can imagine how you may have thought that figure was going to leap up. You just never know when you go to galleries these days… Coincidentally, I just wrote a short post about QAGOMA for Naidoc week. Snap!
Very lovely and folk who live in big cities like Sydney are indeed lucky to have access to events like this. I need to make more effort to visit specific exhibitions in London!
You are indeed very fortunate to have such experiences for free. In Canada, we basically have one night, usually after 6pm that the galleries and museums are free, otherwise, they are a hefty entrance fee that does not include special exhibits which are more: AGO (Art Gallery of Ontario) $19.50 Adult, or $50 for a family (usually 2 adults, 2 kids). ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) $17.00 Adult, $14 or $15 for children and students), McMichael Gallery (houses many Group of Seven and Indigenous Art), $15 (includes special exhibits). The Ontario Science Centre is $22 adult, $13 children, $16 youth without special exhibits or IMAX movies. It is OUTRAGEOUS and shameful. My parents could not have afforded to take the family for such an outing. I cannot recall when it became so elitist to be able to enjoy history, art and science.
What a great post! Have you seen they have an Asian calligraphy exhibition coming up? I can’t wait for that one.