George Bernard Duncan, preliminary sketch for Australian Nativity, Blake Prize for Religious Art entry

SV/370

fonds

approximately 1956

Graphic Materials, Drawings

9658017

1 drawing - 35 x 22 cm - pencil

George Bernard Duncan (1904-1974), Australian artist, was director of David Jones Art Gallery, president of the Australian Watercolour Instiutute, and treasurer of the Comtemporary Art Society. He was a regular entrant in the Blake Prize for Religious Art.

Born in New Zealand to Australian parents, he had to leave school at 14 to work in an oil company due to his family’s difficult financial situation. However due to his artistic talent he soon became a student of maestro Antonio Dattilo-Rubbo at the Royal Art Society. In the 1930s Duncan went to Britain and Europe to study. He worked as a camouflage artist during World War II.

Duncan married fellow artist Alison Rehfisch, and together they socialised with other artists such as Margaret Coen, Dora Jarret and Norman Lindsay.

The Blake Prize for Religious Art, now the Blake Prize, was established in 1949 with the first prize being awarded in 1951. The prize was administered by the Blake Society until 2016 when the Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre took over its management.

References:
Australian Water Colour Institute. “George Duncan.” Accessed 23 May 2022
https://awi.com.au/about-us/presidents/biographies/george-duncan/
Casula Powerhouse Arts Centre. “The Blake Art Prize.” Accessed 23 May 2022
https://www.casulapowerhouse.com/get-involved/prizes/prizes/the-blake-art-prize
Power, Rachel. “Duncan, George Bernard (1904–1974).” Australian Dictionary of Biography. Accessed 23 May 2022
https://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/duncan-george-bernard-12099
Library Acquisition file

1 sketch, drawn in pencil, with red grid lines, showing an Aboriginal woman and baby surrounded by Australian native plants and animals. Uluru is in the background.

In copyright:
Please acknowledge:: Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales and Courtesy copyright holder

Art dealer's catalogue entry card, on the back of the original frame, states, '46. Design for Nativity, 1956 pencil, 34 x 22 Gridded for enlargement into 30 x 40 oil painting. Australian Nativity was the name given to this large allegorical oil painting by Duncan in 1956 on his return to Sydney. It is for an entry in the Blake Prize for religious subjects. It show an Aboriginal woman and her baby in central Australia. Above them are parrots, Kookaburra, lyrebird, koala, dancing brolgas. They are framed by interlacing ghost gums on each side with Ayers Rock in the distance and the Southern Cross behind. It did not win the prize but was acquired by Noburo Nishikawa, Toyota's first representative in Australia and taken by him to Japan in 1984. $300'