/ Current Exhibitions

MELBOURNE BOHEMIA
Inside Melbourne Artists' Studios
5 September to 25 November 2007

Melbourne Bohemia recreates Melbourne’s artists’ studios from the 1880s to the 1940s, through paintings, photographs and period studio artefacts.

In the early twentieth century, there was much speculation about what was going on behind the curtains of Melbourne Bohemia. Popular reports of artists’ studios framed the way in which their lives were imagined. Hundreds of Melbourne artists chose to have their studios in inner city buildings, however, the dominance of landscape painting in Australian art meant that the role of the studio in their practice was often neglected.

Whether lavishly decorated or Spartan and grubby, the studio was a multi-purpose space well before the idea was fashionable, with artists frequently also eating and sleeping there.

Featuring significant artworks from the period drawn from collections nationwide, Melbourne Bohemia takes you inside the studios where magic was made. The exhibition also revisits Melbourne’s renowned teaching studios, from the George Bell school to the influential teaching studio of Meldrum-school painters Archibald and Amalie Colquhoun. Melbourne Bohemia reunites a number of Lindsay Bernard Hall interiors that depict his grand and lofty space at the National Gallery School.

This unique exhibition also features a rare glimpse at original equipment from the studios of leading Melbourne artists: from palettes and paintboxes to easels, charcoals, and brushes, as well as original artefacts from Grosvenor Chambers and the many other homes of Melbourne Bohemia.

Guest Curator: Alex Taylor

Perils of the Studio
Inside the artistic affairs of bohemian Melbourne

By Alex Taylor
$59.95

Available at City Museum Melbourne and at all good bookstores

This exhibition coincides with the release of a major publication exploring the artists studio in Australian art. Focusing on Melbourne’s inner-city bohemia, including the famous Grosvenor Chambers at 9 Collins Street, this major publication is the first attempt to examine the role of the studio in Australian art. This unique cultural history combines stories and anecdotes drawn from period newspapers and magazines with reproductions of rarely-seen works by painters, photographers and cartoonists. More than 200 pages in length and published in hard cover, Perils of the Studio is an essential addition to any Australian art lover’s library.

Published by Australian Scholarly Press with the State Library of Victoria
Supported by the City of Melbourne

ARTEFACT
A Melbourne Keepsake
28 July 2007 to 24 February 2008

Artefact is where art meets historical relic in Making Melbourne, City Museum’s chronological survey of Melbourne’s evolution. Thirteen contemporary artists weave their small-scale works through the historical artefacts of the permanent exhibition – works that grapple with questions of narrative, with traditional forms of display, with diorama and the relationship between physical objects and technology.

Artefact enriches Making Melbourne with the mystery and seduction of craft-based art practice, just as the museological context of Old Treasury’s nineteenth century environs inject an elegiac disquiet into the contemporary installations, playing off their allusions to grandeur.

Making Melbourne

Tracing the story of the city from early settlement to the present day.

Built on Gold

The story of Victoria’s gold, its journey and legacy in the years 1852-1862.

Growing Up in the Old Treasury

Recreating the caretaker’s apartments, as occupied 1916-1928.

Gold and Prosperity

The Vizard Foundation collection of colonial gold and silver.

/ Events

Thursday 13 September
2.00pm
Curator Talk
Presented by Alex Taylor, guest curator, Melbourne Bohemia: Inside Melbourne Artists’ Studios.

Tuesday 25 September
2.00pm
Artefact: An Artist’s Perspective
Join artists participating in Artefact for an informal discussion about their work.
Free with entry

Friday 28 September
Grand Final Parade
Steps of Old Treasury

Tuesday 2 October
and
Wednesday 3 October
10.30am-noon
The Artist’s Studio
Climb to the top floor of the Old Treasury. Take in views of Collins Street, the Windsor Hotel and the Parliament of Victoria. Visit our ‘loft studio’ and choose your paint, pastels or pencils. Create your very own picture of this corner of Melbourne.
$7 per child, for 9-12 year olds

Saturday 13 October
10.30am-noon
Melbourne Bohemia Walking Tour
Join guest curator Alex Taylor for an insight into the many artist studios and other bohemian sites covered in his book Perils of the Studio. This exclusive walking tour will conclude with coffee at a popular bohemian ‘hang-out’, and the opportunity to discuss bohemian Melbourne.
$25 / $20 concession. Includes coffee
Book early – numbers strictly limited

For more information and bookings for all events please contact City Museum on (03) 9651 2233.