Noel Counihan, Study for a Changing City, 1976, Melbourne, Yarra river, Princes Bridge, Flinders Street Station
Summary
Renowned Melbourne artist Noel Counihan (1913–86) studied drawing at Victoria's National Gallery Art School before he began painting in the early 1940s, also working in linocut printing. His practice was shaped by a realism that reflected his leftist politics, social values and sympathies for the working class. His politics were cast in the context of his birth family and the intellectual foment of the interwar years, and a strong social consciousness and deep humanity continued to shape his life and art until his death, in 1986.
'Study for a Changing City' was acquired for the Art and Heritage Collection in 1993, from Pat Counihan, the widow of the artist. Painted around 1976, after Noel Counihan had returned from a period overseas, the artwork illustrates a vastly different city to the one he grew up in. The city buildings behind the Princes Bridge and the watery expanse of the Yarra express a certain optimism of post-mid-century modernity, yet there is also a murkiness to the sky and river that perhaps gestures at the environmental impact of increasing urbanism. While the graphic command and the palette identify this painting with Counihan, the softness and 'looseness' of the brushwork also underscore the fact it is a study for a larger work. With its urban focus, both this study and its resulting pair follow from Counihan's late 1960s series 'High Rises'.
