Why I’m writing fewer reviews of art exhibitions

When I started this blog in 2008, I wrote a review of a gallery for every second post. Melbourne had over 200 art galleries, and most art exhibitions went unreviewed. Most exhibitions never got any critical attention, good or bad. Now, I no longer review as many art exhibitions. I still go to art exhibitions but don’t write reviews of them. I don’t feel the need anymore and haven’t paid much attention to the commercial gallery scene for a few years.

I have become less enamoured by art galleries for several reasons. Partially because one of the effects of Melbourne’s extended COVID lockdowns was to emphasise what I already knew: there is more to the visual arts than art galleries. COVID restrictions put a damper on visiting galleries, from which I never fully recovered. Now, I don’t think I have the energy to do the long gallery crawls I used to do.

After examining art crimes, I was aware of art galleries laundering money, dealing in looted antiquities, and various marketing scams that create artificial scarcity (NFT art made that too obvious to ignore). And it is not just specific commercial galleries but the institutional galleries providing support for tasteless, artificially scarce, high-end products leading to the corruption of curatorial independence by brands using them as platforms (see my post Is the NGV a high end department store?). Along with the art-washing service they provide their donors.

For example, the NGV does not give providence information to the public, so we don’t know if items in its collection passed through the thieving hands of  Subhash Kapoor,  Dynamite Doug Lachtford or similar dealers in looted antiquities. The NGV’s Olmec collection is no longer on permanent exhibition. It was acquired as a tax dodge in 1980 along with its dodgy provenance (looted or forged). The NGV describes its provenance as “Presented anonymously, 1980” (nothing to see here).

But mostly, I am writing fewer art exhibition reviews because I’m less interested in that aspect of art and culture. When I started this blog, every second post was about something other than art exhibitions: street art, public sculpture, and my other poorly described ‘categories’ of blog posts. I never intended this blog to be about art exhibitions, so I titled it “Art and Culture Critic.” I wasn’t writing to industry insiders; I wanted to write about art for people who don’t read much about art.

There is more about visual culture on this city’s streets than in all art galleries, from public sculpture to street art. And these things are as important, often immediate and public concerns like the actions to remove statues of colonial heroes or the removal of a mural because of accusations of anti-semitism. 

Melbourne’s street art is the most important cultural movement to emerge from this city in my lifetime, and I would have been foolish to ignore it. It was also intellectually stimulating, with several outstanding academics in the city researching the subject. It speaks to a human need to participate in visual culture, not just as a receiver but as a transmitter. And it has the added bonus of joyful discoveries on psychogeographical meanderings around the city.

So, I will still be writing reviews of art exhibitions, but there will probably be fewer of them. If you want more local exhibition reviews, try Memo Review.

In Chelsea you have to put up a sign to say that it is not a gallery.

The “True” Story

Another fictional explanation for the unsolved theft of Picasso’s Femme au mouchoir (the Weeping Woman) from the NGV has been published – Framed – The “True” Story of the Theft of Picasso’s Weeping Woman (Brolga, 2024). It is the fourth novel that uses theft in its plot. The three other novels are Anson Cameron’s Stealing Picasso in 2009, Chris Womersley’s Cairo in 2013, and Gabrielle William’s The Guy, the Girl, the Artist and His Ex in 2016. There is little originality in Australian art crime fiction, with the same crimes turned into works of fiction again and again.

Pablo Picasso, Femme au mouchoir, 1938

This time, the novel is written by Stuart Rosson, which is significant because Peter Rosson (1954-2002) and his partner Margaret Casey were accused of the crime. They were cleared by police, along with many other suspects. Other artists have also been implicated in the crime without evidence. Fictional “true” stories are written by authors hoping to avoid dealing with messy facts and defamation laws. So maybe Rosson’s book has something for the insiders, the people who remember Melbourne’s bitchy art world of the early 1980s.

It is an unfortunate title, the same as the Marc Fennel documentary on the same subject. Fennel’s documentary also covers the false accusations against Rosson, but not the false accusation about another artist based solely on the after-dinner institutions of a prominent Melbourne gallery director that Patrick McCaughey writes about in his autobiography.

I haven’t read any of these novels as I’m not interested in people’s fantasies about the infamous theft. I am more interested in many of the other Australian art crimes I researched for my book, The Picasso Ransom. Of course, there is a chapter on the artnapping of the Weeping Woman, telling the true story of the theft and ransom demands as it progressed daily for two weeks until the painting was returned. But there are many other stories of art crimes in Australia, some as fantastic and ridiculous as that of the Weeping Woman. Another painting by Picasso was taken from the Queensland Art Gallery, the former chief magistrate of NSW was arrested for selling stolen paintings, an ordinary thief once stole what he thought was a Cezanne, and many more stories of art theft, forgery, vandalism and accusations of obscenity. 

Goodbye 2023

Fourteen exhibitions. Six public artworks. Two art fairs. One writers’ festival. And a variety of promotional posts for my book The Picasso Ransom.

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In local art news, Victor Gris resigned after a decade as director of the Counihan Gallery in Brunswick. I appreciated the way he engaged with the local community. The enlarged gallery space was a physical improvement during his time, but Victor also made many intangible improvements in the gallery and Brunswick’s culture. He has left to advance his career and take on a new position; he is not doing or planning anything, which is so cool.

The destruction of Mic Porter’s mural in Balaclava and Anna Schwartz Gallery, ending her thirty-six-year-long representation of Mike Parr, are disproportionate responses to nonexistent threats posed by paint. They are, unfortunately, not isolated incidents. These irrational acts of cultural vandalism have also been happening in Europe and North America and serve only as demonstrations of power.

‘Restore what has been entrusted to you.’ was one of the sayings of the sages of Ancient Greece. This has been represented in the thousands of objects returned from the hoards American and European museums have amassed, many stolen by Subhash Kapoor’s or Douglas Lachford’s antiquities smuggling organisations. However, this wisdom has been ignored by the rapidly fading British Empire, which still wants to hold onto its looted Acropolis marbles. Another pathetic demonstration of power by a colonial nation well past its use-by date.

And so as not to end on a gloomy note, here is an amazing one-shot video of a fantastic performance of that old Velvet Underground song, All Tomorrow’s Parties, by the Kodály Method – Keleti Block, an art and music studio in Budapest, to enjoy as we party while the earth is burning.

Goodbye to 2023. Thanks for reading.

Black Mark at the movies

My first appearance on the big screen is in Melbourne-based director Sean McDonald’s documentary Bromley – Light After Dark. It is a talking role as the art critic who doesn’t recommend buying designer balderdash. I’m not on screen for long. I get about two sentences out for the whole film. One of them is: “David seems to overproduce; there doesn’t seem to be any editing.” After seeing the film, I have no doubt.

I didn’t learn a lot more about Bromley from the film. Bromley hams it up for the cameras for as long as they are pointed at him. There is nothing below the surface of his art, and there is a lot in the film showing him mass-producing surfaces for his painting in the most dramatic ways he can imagine. It is all designer decor, so I did get a laugh when someone suggested there should be an NGV retrospective for Bromley.

David Wenham (Faramir LOTR) appears because he is a friend of David Bromley. I was pleased to see arts writer Andrew Frost was also in it (I’ve never met him but admire his work). It was interesting to see the disconnect between what Bromley thought critics were saying about his work and what actual critics said about it. This isn’t about being gatekeepers, and this isn’t personal.

Disguised by the beard I’ve grown since filming, I went to the Nova in Carlton to see the documentary. If I was worried someone might recognise me, I needn’t have as there were six other people in Cinema 15, the smallest in the Nova’s complex.

The experience of being in the film was cool, about an hour of sitting in front of a camera talking. It was another chance to meet interesting people and do something different. So, yes, I would recommend it to others as a three-star identity-affirming experience.

I’ve been told I also briefly appear in The Whitely Art Scandal, a documentary about an art forgery trial, which premiered three months ago on ABC. I’m not speaking, and I didn’t notice my appearance when I watched it; I was paying close attention to how they were narrating the story. I must have been filmed going in or out of the Supreme Court when I was researching the story for The Picasso Ransom.

BAD Sydney Crime Writers Festival

The BAD Sydney Crime Writers Festival at the NSW State Library feels like an odd event for Black Mark – Melbourne Art and Culture Critic, to have a blog post about. But apart from the panel I was on about “Art crimes in life and fiction”, there was also a panel about “The Arts behind bars”. It was also another excuse to promote my book, The Picasso Ransom and other stories about art and crime in Australia.

“Art crimes in life and fiction” was facilitated by Dr Pamela James, an art historian at the Western Sydney University researching art crimes. Dr James appears in The Mission, a documentary (currently on SBS) about the art heist at New Norcia in WA, and her expressive eyes punctuate Marc Fennel’s commentary. There were two fiction writers on the panel: John M Green, who wrote Framed, a thriller about stolen art and Alexandra Joel, who wrote The Artist’s Secret, a mystery romance set in the NYC art world of the 1980s. They were both from Sydney and wearing blue; as I’m from Melbourne, so head to foot, I’m dressed in black.

The big question is, why are art crimes currently popular in crime writing and documentaries? I thought they were always popular, but maybe that was just me. There is also the post-colonial realisation that the victims are not just the very wealthy but some of the poorest people in the world, who are having their culture, even their gods, stolen from them or devalued through forgeries. Art crime is also low on violence, gore, and copaganda.

“The arts behind bars” presented an excellent overview of arts programs in NSW prisons. Aunty Barbara Nicholson, a Wadi Wadi Elder from the Illawarra, talked about her creative writing program, Murray Cook spoke about his music program (he also has a drama program) and Damian Moss about visual arts and Boom Gate Gallery at Long Bay Gaol. Murray Cook has been a music teacher at Long Bay Gaol for 21 years, serving more time than most of his students, except for corrupt cop Roger “the Dodger” Rogerson.

Having long followed and written about The Torch program for Indigenous prisoners in Victoria, I was interested in the difference between the states. Unlike Victoria, all prisoners in NSW can keep whatever they earn from the art they make in prison. At the Boom Gate Gallery, the artists get 75% of the sale price directly into the inmate’s account, so they can immediately spend the money or send it to their family.

The sad fact is that although it is well-known what programs work to reduce recidivism, Australian politics is too populist to tolerate treating prisoners decently. Too often, funding for programs will be for one-off programs with no roll-over funding, regardless of their results. The result is a terrible recidivation rate and consistently more expensive prisons, but Australians don’t care, in part because most are Indigenous. 

I also went to a few other sessions. “Pentridge Australia’s most infamous jail” with Ron Isherwood and John Killick, two former crims who have both written books. “Melbourne Crime vs Sydney Crime” featured two crime reporters, Mark Morri (Sydney) and John Silvester (Melbourne). They agreed that the main difference between Melbourne and Sydney is that in Melbourne, the police shoot people and actively conceal corruption. In contrast, in Sydney, the police are corrupt and actively conceal honesty. 

Michael Duffy (middle) facilitating discussion between John Silvester (left) and Mark Morri (right)

Art Critic to True Crime Writer

I’m happy to announce that I’m part of BAD 2023; see the Sydney Crime Writers Festival program. I guess I’m a real true crime writer. It sounds better than ‘art critic’ or ‘arts writer’. And, as I’m in BAD, the festival’s official bookshop, the Library Bookshop at the Library of NSW now stocks my book, The Picasso Ransom.

I’m on a panel on the 2nd of November at BAD about art crimes: “Art Crimes in Fiction and Life”. The panel is led by Dr Pamela James, an art historian from Western Sydney University who studies art crime. My fellow panellists have sent me their crime thriller books to read. John M. Green’s Framed (Pantera Press) and Alexandra Joel’s The Artist’s Secret (Harper Collins) are both novels based on true crimes.

The difference between writing fiction and non-fiction is that fiction has to be believable, whereas non-fiction is often unbelievable. Who would believe the famous American art critic, Clement Greenberg, being shown pictures of fake Jackson Pollocks in a copy of  The Women’s Weekly? Or a fugitive American graffiti writer being arrested in the Melbourne suburb of Fitzroy, a suburb where there is more graffiti per centimetre of vertical outdoor space than anywhere else in the world.

How did an art critic become a true crime writer? At first, it was a gradual transition, an interest in art forgery coupled with a Melbourne resident’s interest in stories like the theft of the Weeping Woman and Ivan Durrant dumping a body outside the NGV. After I started this blog, I found myself writing and reporting on the unfounded accusations, first against Bill Henson and then, in more detail, those against Paul Yore. This included reporting on Yore’s trial at the magistrates court. Due to my focus on public art, I was also writing about vandalism and theft of sculptures. And, due to my interest in graffiti, I was hanging around with Professor Alison Young, “Banksy’s favourite criminologist”, whose perception of the lawscape was influencing my understanding of the city. So, when it came to thinking about what to write after my first book, Sculptures of Melbourne, the choice was obvious.

The hard part came after I had decided to write a book about art crimes, and I had to learn how to be a true crime writer. I was at a disadvantage with contacts compared to former cops and criminals; however, when I needed background information from someone who had been a prisoner in Pentridge in the 1970s, I could find a reliable source that I’d met at a playwriting workshop years before. I learnt when dealing with the Libertos, a couple of forgers, that there are different approaches to social media between an arts writer who tends to broadcast what they are doing and a true crime writer, but then I never want to be friends with them. And most difficult of all, I had to learn to write exciting stories full of mystery and drama.

Promoting The Picasso Ransom

As a self-published author, I’m still promoting my new book, The Picasso Ransom and other stories about art and crime in Australia. It is a collection of forty-five true-crime stories about the visual arts in Australia, including the title story about the 1986 theft of Pablo Picasso’s painting Weeping Woman from the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne. The other stories in the book cover a wide range of art-related crimes, from art theft and forgery to art censorship and vandalism.

To give readers a taste of my book, I’ve posted videos of myself reading some parts from it: “Australia’s Most Wanted” and “The Ransom Letter” on YouTube and TikTok. It’s worth noting that none of the advice on promoting your book I’ve seen suggested planning a year-long campaign. But, an author does need a lengthy promotional campaign for a book.

The Picasso Ransom features current and relevant stories, some of which have even made it to the news. Recently, the NGA returned three looted Cambodian statues. They are still dealing with the aftermath of the discovery that Subhash Kapoor sold a stolen Nataraja to them.

The Whiteley Art Scandal is an upcoming ABC TV documentary that delves into the Peter Gant and Aman Saddique trial. It is based on Gabriella Coslovich’s award-winning book, Whitely on Trial, rather than the chapter in my book.

Unfortunately, Sydney art dealer Tim Klingender died in a tragic boating accident. He was known for setting high ethical standards in dealing with Indigenous art. I had the opportunity to interview him about his discovery of Libertos forgeries.

The only Australian state that I hadn’t heard of art theft in is Tasmania, but sadly, there is now one. Aunty Jeanette James, an Indigenous artist, had a necklace made of Echidna quills stolen from the “Difficult Terrain: Contemporary Tasmanian Jewellery” exhibition. I hope the thief decides to return it rather than hoard it.

Please, buy my book, ask your local library to buy my book, ask your local bookshop to order my book. If you have bought my book already, thank you, and please, write a review of it on Goodreads or Amazon or your own blog.