Australia ordered by Noel McKenna

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Butterflies of Australia 2010 / Synthetic polymer paint on canvas / Courtesy: The artist and Niagara Galleries, Melbourne / Photograph: Jenni Carter

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Butterflies of Australia 2010 / Synthetic polymer paint on canvas / Courtesy: The artist and Niagara Galleries, Melbourne / Photograph: Jenni Carter / View full image

Welcome to Noel McKenna’s ‘Map’ series where instinct meets a most personal experience. Born and educated in Brisbane and now based in Sydney, McKenna is one of Australia’s most industrious and idiosyncratic artists. With a busy career spanning more than 30 years, his work is admired for its spare brushstrokes and poignant observations.

McKenna’s maps order Australia’s vast continent and here we focus on the two extremes – deadly snakes, spiders and sea-life and our loved birds, fish and butterflies. Hear from the artist himself as he takes us through his childhood memories, his discoveries, and how he tackled the task of mapping Australia.

Dangerous Australia

Dangerous Australia 2007 posits that, despite having a large number of the world’s most venomous snakes, spiders and sea-life, we are statistically more likely to die by human hands than be taken by any of these. We are more likely to die after a fall, by accidental drowning, by smoke and fire, or even by our own hands, than we are from the bite of a creepy-crawly. We may be afraid of the wilderness, but it is the wilderness that should be afraid of us.

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Dangerous Australia 2007 / Synthetic polymer paint on canvas / Purchased 2010 / Collection: The University of Queensland

Shark and Ray Species

Shark, Ray Species of Australia 2006 is the only work of this group that lists its subject completely. Like wildlife photography, bushwalking and other activities that foster contact with nature, A self-described animal person, McKenna knows the value of a domestic animal’s companionship, but also of communing with natural beauty. His affection for nature evokes the kind of awareness that engenders our instinct to care for and protect it. It seems useful to strengthen this because, as we have seen, we are expert at building infrastructure and encroaching on the natural world.

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Shark, Ray Species of Australia 2006 / Oil and enamel on canvas / Private collection, Melbourne / Image courtesy: Niagara Galleries, Melbourne

Birds, fish and butterflies

The natural environment is lovingly chronicled in Birds of Australia 2004, Australian Freshwater Fish 2005 and Butterflies of Australia 2010, showing mere fragments of the remarkable diversity of wildlife that occupies the sea and sky around us.

‘I have always liked birds, so why not do all the birds of Australia? I quickly realised that with the number of birds in Australia, I would have trouble getting them all on the size of map I had been doing, so I decided to do just birds that lived in a limited area, as well as endangered ones.’

‘I decided on Australian Freshwater Fish as ones caught in the ocean do live in other parts of the ocean and not just around Australia. Fishing is a big part of Australian life, with many shows devoted to fishing on TV. It seems to be one of those aspects of life where fishermen go to be with their friends or by themselves. When my sons were growing up, we spent many hours sitting on our pier in Sydney Harbour, hardly ever catching anything, but still finding it enjoyable.’

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Birds of Australia 2004 / Synthetic polymer paint on canvas / Collection: James and Jacqui Erskine, Sydney / Image courtesy: Darren Knight Gallery, Sydney

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Australian Freshwater Fish 2005 / Oil and synthetic polymer paint on canvas / Collection: Cornish Family, Melbourne / Image courtesy: Niagara Galleries, Melbourne

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Butterflies of Australia 2010 / Synthetic polymer paint on canvas / Courtesy: The artist and Niagara Galleries, Melbourne / Photograph: Jenni Carter

Big Things

Big Things, Australia 2004 — an outline map of the country populated with images and descriptions of ‘big’ tourist attractions, from the Big Pineapple to the Big Golf Ball —was inspired by a TV documentary.

‘I had seen a film, Big Things of Australia, which got my interest, but I discovered there were a lot more than were featured in the film, and more have been built since I finished my painting.’

Noel McKenna, Australia b.1956 / Big Things, Australia 2004 / Synthetic polymer paint on canvas / Private collection / Image courtesy: Darren Knight Gallery, Sydney

DELVE DEEPER INTO your australian ART collection. Discover more about Noel mckenna

The works in Noel McKenna’s ‘Map’ series are on display as a group for the first time in ‘Noel McKenna: Landscape – Mapped‘ at the Queensland Art Gallery (QAG) until 2 April 2018. The exhibition publication Noel McKenna: Landscape – Mapped is available from our QAGOMA Stores and online.

Feature banner detail: Noel McKenna’s Butterflies of Australia 2010

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    Noel McKenna maps Australia

    As a career artist since the early 1980s, Noel McKenna has honed what is best described as an idiosyncratic vision in paint, print and the occasional ceramic. Those who are already aware of his practice will know that his regular subjects include napping pets, cats and dogs begging for food at the table, watchful birds, people reading and people watching television. The works in McKenna’s ‘Map’ series, on display as a group for the first time in ‘Noel McKenna: Landscape – Mapped‘ at the Queensland Art Gallery until 2 April 2018, are information-rich, with something of the obsessive focus of a trainspotter in them. They are a contribution to the dialogues of nationhood and space, answering, one map at a time, the elemental question: What is Australia made of? There are 19 works in the series: 13 of these take Australia as their central motif. One is of New Zealand. A further four provide finer details of parts of Australia: Queensland, Brisbane, Sydney’s Centennial Park, and the Sydney CBD’s public toilets (the male toilets, at least). Finally, SELF 2011 charts the artist’s life events in corresponding degrees of happiness in a graph. SUBSCRIBE TO OUR YOUTUBE CHANNEL TO VIEW MORE ON nOEL mCKENNA The exhibition, which groups these ‘Map’ works into three main themes — infrastructure, nature and memory — allows us to venture beyond their general-interest topics and glimpse a few impressions of the national character. About his work Big Things, Australia 2004, the artist himself writes: ‘One of the reasons towns build these Big Things is to attract tourists and to be noticed and I have seen similar things in New Zealand and the United States, but while not sure, I feel maybe we have more per capita than anywhere in the world? . . . They do work in getting towns noticed on the tourist map, but it is a different approach to a regional town in Italy that is known for a particular type of cheese made the same way for 300 years’. McKenna’s appreciation for the ‘things’ of Australia, naive as it might seem on the surface, is sophisticated and contagious. His enthusiasm for classification, description and location endows us with facts, and facts build confidence. We are better acquainted with our country, and with ourselves, for his efforts. This is an edited excerpt of texts by Peter McKay and artist Noel McKenna, which feature in the exhibition publication Noel McKenna: Landscape – Mapped, alongside an essay by Australian author Graeme Simsion. Peter McKay is Curator, Contemporary Australian Art, QAGOMA
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    Noel McKenna appreciates the things of Australia

    The Gallery has been gifted three of Brisbane-born artist Noel McKenna’s map paintings, the artist’s gentle and good humoured appreciation for the ‘things’ of Australia makes us better acquainted with our country, and with ourselves. Peter McKay profiles our three new works and delves into their inspiration. Australian Racecourse Locations Australian Racecourse Locations 2002 is, in fact, the first in McKenna’s ‘Map’ series. McKenna has been a horseracing enthusiast since the age of ten when his father, Jim, first took him to a meet. Captivated by the competition and camaraderie of the jockeys, bookmakers, trainers — and, of course, the magnificence of the horses — he also saw that his usually quiet father seemed to belong at the races. McKenna began researching racecourses around the country well before the internet became the comprehensive resource it is today, writing to hundreds of regional post offices to ask them if they had a local racetrack. ‘The majority replied to me — one from Laverton in Western Australia even went out and photographed the track for me,’ McKenna says. Free of imagery or adornment beyond the red locations dots, the understated ambition of this work draws viewers in as they turn through their own memories to try to locate the ones they know of, and undoubtedly registering new ones in the process. Birds of Australia Not just a hippophile but an all-round animal person, McKenna also painted an illustrated guide to the Birds of Australia in 2004. Known for his portraits of pet birds, McKenna sourced these images from The Field Guide to Birds of Australia by Graham Pizzey and Frank Knight, making use of its precision and accuracy. In spite of the exacting nature of this source material, it seems McKenna’s renditions can’t help but exude a little hop and flutter. While we might look at birds and dream of the great distances they travel, McKenna’s birds are mostly of the stay-at-home variety. Soon after starting his research, he quickly realised the scale of the task, given Australia’s nearly 900 recorded bird species: ‘I would have trouble getting them all on the size of map I had been doing, so I decided to do just birds that lived in a limited area, as well as endangered ones.’ Of the 69 species in McKenna’s painting, 17 are identified as vulnerable or critically endangered, including the Black-breasted Button-quail and Albert’s lyrebird, both found in south-east Queensland. Queenslander Queenslander 2004 is another work of great personal significance to the artist, reflecting on the distinct Queensland vernacular and history that became much more apparent to McKenna after he relocated over the border in his early twenties. ‘After moving to Sydney, for the first couple of years, I was often called a “banana bender” when I mentioned to people that I had moved down from Brisbane,’ he says. ‘Queenslanders in the 1970s were seen as being not quite as sophisticated as people from Sydney and Melbourne and I think we believed it ourselves.’ Full of social, political and culinary insights, Queenslander is a work of endearing self-reflection and self-confidence. In our digital world, the construction of physical maps becomes an absurd labour. Yet McKenna’s sincere interest in his subjects makes these maps a labour of love and good humour. McKenna’s gentle appreciation for the ‘things’ of Australia, and his enthusiasm for classification, description and location makes us better acquainted with our country, and with ourselves. Peter McKay is Curatorial Manager, Australian Art, QAGOMA READ more on Noel McKenna / SUBSCRIBE to our YouTube channel to keep up-to-date with our latest videos and hear directly from the artists. Feature image detail: Noel McKenna’s Birds of Australia 2004
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