DOCUMENTARY (MELBOURNE AS ROME), 1989

Details

JON CATTAPAN (B. 1956)
DOCUMENTARY (MELBOURNE AS ROME), 1989
signed and dated 'Cattapan 89' (lower right); further signed, titled and dated 'Jon Cattapan/Documentary (Melbourne as Rome)/October 1989' (on the reverse)
oil on canvas
212.7 x 181.4 cm
1

Literature

Moët & Chandon Touring Exhibition, exh., cat., 1990, illus.
V. Trioli, 'Do Not Bother to go to Calcutta', in Imaging the City, Melbourne, 1992, p. 69-73

Exhibited

Brisbane, Queensland Art Gallery; Sydney, Art Gallery of New South Wales; Canberra, Australian National Gallery; Adelaide, Art Gallery of South Australia; Perth, Art Gallery of Western Australia; Melbourne, Westpac Gallery, Victorian Arts Centre, Moët & Chandon Touring Exhibition, 21 February - 9 December 1990
Sydney, DCArt, Jon Cattapan, 1989

Special notice

A 10% Goods and Services tax (G.S.T) will be charged on the Buyer's Premium on all lots in this sale.

Lot Essay

"In 1989 the Melbourne artist John (sic) Cattapan paints a picture entitled Documentary: Melbourne as Rome. As a piece of documentation, it is pure fiction. The yellow-brown Yarra becomes the blue-green Tiber; Princess Bridge slides across it and becomes the Ponte Sant'Angelo; the dome of Flinders Street Station shimmers into being as Saint Peter's. A prostitute shuffles across the scene as La Putana - she inches her skirt over her hips and narrows her eyes. She bites her thumb at the young boys and they howl. It is a vision that is resonant with the snap-shot longings of itinerant Melburnians... Cattapan's city is 'filmed' through the blue fish-eye of desire and memory..." (V. Trioli, op.cit., pp. 69-70)

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