Hans Heysen

Lot 23 HANS HEYSEN (1877-1968) The Hillside, Glen Osmond 1936 oil on canvas 81.5 x 99.0 cm signed and dated lower right: Hans Heysen 1936 signed, dated and inscribed verso: 'HILLSIDE' Glen Osmond/ HANS HEYSEN/ HAHNDORF/ South Australia Provenance: Sir Tom Barr Smith collection, South Australia Thence by descent, private collection, Sydney Sotheby's, Sydney, 26 November 2007, lot 20 Savill Galleries, Sydney (label attached verso) Private collection, Sydney Deutscher-Menzies, Sydney, 24 June 2009, lot 49 Private collection, Melbourne Menzies, Melbourne, 15 December 2010, lot 52 Private collection, Melbourne Exhibited: Hans Heysen , Royal South Australian Society of Arts Gallery, Adelaide, October 1937, cat.1 Loan Exhibition of Paintings , Australian Red Cross, Adelaide, March 1958 (label attached verso) Adelaide Festival of Arts 1974 , John Martin and Co., Adelaide, 1974 cat.49 (label attached verso) Estimate: $ 40000 - 50000 Auction Title: Sydney - 21 March 2013 - (Macedon - 0061) Important Australian & International Fine Paintings & Sculpture 21 March 2013 6.30pm Menzies Gallery, 12 Todman Avenue, Kensington, NSW 2033 VIEWING MELBOURNE 7 – 10 MARCH, 11am-6pm Menzies Gallery, 1 Darling Street, SOUTH YARRA VIC 3141 VIEWING SYDNEY 14 – 20 MARCH, 11am-6pm Menzies Gallery, 12 Todman Avenue, KENSINGTON NSW 2033 Winner of the prestigious Wynne Prize a record nine times, Sir Hans Heysen is one of the most prolific and influential Australian landscape artists of the 20th century. Heysen’’s contribution to our national cultural identity through his atmospheric renderings of the iconic Australian eucalypt has shaped the way generations of Australians identify with the local landscape. In 1939 Heysen revealed the mechanisms behind the inspiration that drove his art for more than seventy years: ‘In all its stages the gum tree is extremely beautiful - first for being a tiny sucker with broad leaves, shooting up like a fountain answering to the slightest breeze - at middle age it becomes more sturdy, more closely knit and bulky, yet never losing grace in the movement of its limbs and the sweep of its foliage.’’1 Heysen’’s contribution has been so influential that the whole nation has come to see the gum tree as he saw it. Though Heysen’’s imagery was principally inspired by the picturesque landscape around the Adelaide Hills and later the Flinders Ranges, all Australians are drawn to his work as it conjures a visual memory of our own experience of the landscape: the vastness of the Australian bush; the intensity of the light; the infinity of the blue sky; and the pastel tones of the pastoral landscape. Heysen knew this landscape intimately. In his art, the eucalypt is recorded with precision and detail. It has been elevated beyond the realms of a botanical emblem, taking on the role of the subject, highlighting Heysen’’s ability to capture the individuality of each specimen. Heysen’’s art is the culmination of decades of living within this landscape and his observations of the minutae of detail within it. Throughout his early career, Heysen supported his artistic practice through teaching. His breakthrough came in 1908, when his close friend Emanuel Phillips Fox arranged a one-man exhibition of his work in Melbourne. The show was opened by Prime Minister Alfred Deakin and was a phenomenal success, both critically and commercially. A second Melbourne exhibition in 1912 enabled Heysen to buy ‘The Cedars’’, a sprawling property in the Hahndorf region of the Adelaide Hills and from this base he created his iconic imagery for the next 56 years. The Hillside, Glen Osmond 1936, represents the region of Glen Osmond that is now a suburb on the outskirts of Adelaide. At the time of this painting’’s conception the area was pastoral land some 20 kilometres northwest of Hahndorf. Although Heysen’’s response to nature was personal, his approach to recording and interpreting it was analytical. He was concerned with accuracy in recording the topography of the landscape, but also with imprinting the image with the emotion and lyricism peculiar to his experience of this landscape. In the featured work, Heysen captures the undulating hills populated by rocky outcrops and fringed with clusters of eucalypts. He has arranged the trees within the landscape as if they are sculptural forms. In this work, as in all his works, Heysen has carefully composed this landscape using detailed sketches he made on location. These sketches were then developed within the studio at ‘The Cedars’’ to create the major painting. His aim was to achieve balance and harmony within the composition whilst manipulating the perspective to direct the viewer’’s eye through the scene. In The Hillside, Glen Osmond , this effect is created by the hill that dominates the foreground of the image, drawing the eye further into the gully and beyond. Heysen was highly regarded during his career by critics and collectors, selling paintings directly to the New South Wales, Victoria and South Australian State Galleries. His patrons included notable Australians of the time such as Dame Nellie Melba. In 2009 the Art Gallery of South Australia honoured Heysen with a retrospective exhibition of more than one hundred works. Footnotes: 1. Heysen cited in Thiele, C., ‘Heysen, Sir Wilhelm Ernst Hans (1877–1968)’’, Australian Dictionary of Biography , Adelaide, 1968, np Alison Burns BA (Hons); MA If you cannot attend the auction, you may either: Register to absentee bid on this lot Register to telephone bid on this lot Terms and Conditions Contact us regarding this lot Email a friend

SIR HANS HEYSEN (1877-1968) �White Gums� Watercolour 33x41cm Signed, Dated 1924 Bears Artarmon Gallery label verso No. 5425 This work relates to a watercolour �Gums in Sunlight� (1923) in the Art Gallery of NSW painted in 1924. This work shows Heysen as he is perhaps best remembered, depicting the gum tree as hero and bathed in sunlight.

HANS HEYSEN (1877 – 1968) ROAD TO HAHNDORF, 1955 watercolour on paper 38.5 x 40.5 cm inscribed on authentication label verso: W-71-DHH Authenticated by the artist’’’’s son, David H. Heysen, 1971 (label attached verso) Philip Bacon Galleries, Brisbane (label attached verso) Private collection, Melbourne

Lot 38 HANS HEYSEN (1877-1968) �Prescotts Farm� Circa 1904-7 Pastel 23x30cm Signed, Lower Left, Dated indistinctly. During the years 1904-1905 Heysen devoted much of his time in the use of pastels. Exhibited: Hans Heysen Retrospective 1901-65. Adelaide Festival No. 11 Label verso. Hans Heysen Centenary Retrospective. Art Gallery of South Australia 18771978 No. 75. Label verso. Illus: �The Art of Hans Heysen� Rigby 1966, plate 4 Prov: Stephan Heysen thence by descent. Estimate: $15,000-20,000 Click here to request a Condition Report Click here to print a telephone bidding form [Return to Catalogue]

HANS HEYSEN (1877-1968) Lilydale Landscape (Dame Nellie's Country) also titled Landscape Across the Yarra Valley from Coome Cottage, Coldstream 1915 oil on canvas signed and dated 'HANS HEYSEN 1915' lower left signed and titled 'Lilydale Landscape (Dame Nellie's Country)' on label attached verso alternate title on plaque lower centre inscribed 'canvas for Coldstream Pastures' on canvas verso 60 x 89.5cm PROVENANCE Christies, Australian and European Paintings, Drawings and Prints, Sydney, 14/08/1994, Lot No. 100 Corporate collection, Melbourne