Gordon Bennett

Gellatly, Kelly

National Gallery Of Victoria, 2008

Hardcover and dust jacket. Good binding and cover. Clean, unmarked pages. 135 p., ill., 29 cm.

Gordon Bennett (1955-2014) was an Australian artist of Anglo-Celtic and Aboriginal descent. His bold and humane art challenged racial stereotypes and provoked critical reflection on Australia's official history and national identity. Bennett was one of Australia's most significant and critically engaged contemporary artists, addressing issues relating to the role of language and systems of thought in forging identity. He rejected racial stereotypes and freed himself from being categorized as an Indigenous artist by creating an ongoing pop art inspired alter ego, John Citizen, who he considered to be 'an abstraction of the Australian Mr. Average, the Australian Everyman'. In the late 1990s Bennett began a dialogue with the work of Jean-Michel Basquiat, a New York artist who shared with Bennett a similar western cultural tradition and an obsession with drawing, semiotics and visual language. 

This is an oversized or heavy book, which requires additional postage for international delivery outside the US.