How pleasurable paintings can be. The still life subjects of Frances Fussell and the landscapes of Chris Fussell fill the Cessnock Regional Art Gallery with colour and life in their exhibition The Two of Us. Both artists have had long careers; they met at art school in Sydney in 1967. They have honed their craft over many exhibitions and each has a confident vision still continuing to develop.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Frances Fussell takes on the exotic clutter of Margaret Olley’s home environment with well-organised panache. She wonderfully captures the maze of chairs and tables with their cargo of treasures, including Olley’s hat and palette and enclosing red wall. We now recognise this elaborate scene from its recreation in the Tweed Regional Gallery at Murwillumbah. She also paints groupings of familiar Olley objects, as well as other still life subjects in vivid colour or dazzling chalky white. They more than rival Olley’s own formidable groupings.
Chris Fussell paints awe-inspiring landforms: incandescent red gorges in the MacDonnell Ranges, the terrifying dolerite cliffs on Tasmania’s east coast and beaches and rocky headlands presented as real geological sites. In the best of these paintings, vivid slabs of light bring a surprising magic transformation. He also paints convincing portraits, including one here of well-known teacher and mentor Francis Celtlan, which should certainly be in a public collection.
Some of us will recall similar paintings from 30 or 40 years ago at the von Bertouch galleries with the exotic forged and recycled metal candelabra and chairs also made by Chris. Here are two more artists whose careers thrived in this supportive environment with its visionary doyenne.
I well remember paintings by Frances of lily ponds and can also recall the work by Chris of Redhead Bluff dwarfing the bathers and umbrellas on the beach below. It is good to remember the rapidly receding past and realise the stature of its legacy.
I have recently unearthed a catalogue from the 1994 Collectors Choice exhibition at the von Bertouch Galleries. The Fussells are there with 150 other artists, 16 of them still working. They include Graham Wilson, currently the featured artist at the Adamstown Uniting Church. His long work on the altar wall invokes the coastal landscape of pre-white settlement. He still employs a unique technique of incising plywood to skilfully depict dense vegetation, watery reflections and a distant sea.
Cessnock is the nearest gallery to the Fussells’ rural home. Thanks to a regular commitment from a dozen busy volunteers, it maintains a strong community presence despite the lack of council funding. They run many classes and fundraising events to keep the gallery operational. They are in the process of establishing the Cessnock Regional Art Gallery Sculpture Park at Gartelmann’s Winery at Pokolbin, initially showing work by about 20 sculptors from Cessnock. Vineyards and sculptures work well together, as proved by the yearly temporary exhibition at four sites in Wollombi.
