Lot 156

The Estate of the late Sylvia Carruthers, Point Piper
Goodmans Auctioneers, Australian & European Pictures, Sydney, 5 December 2000, lot 354
Savill Galleries, Sydney
acquired from the above 2006

James Alfred Turner (1850-1908) was an English-born artist who devoted his career to depicting rural life in Australia in painstaking detail. Often featuring the mountain ranges to the north and east of Melbourne where he resided, his paintings tell stories of pioneers battling the rugged Australian bush and their daily pursuits.

Logger, Wagon and Bullock Team is expertly proportioned with a single rising mountain and partially cloudy sky centring the background which lends the painting an atmospheric quality akin to a crisp, fresh autumn morning in the Dandenong Ranges. The settlement in the middleground of the painting shows vivid signs of life with two horses out to graze and a small figure to the far right possibly out the back of their house chopping wood. The wagon and bullock team feature in the very centre of the composition following a winding road which leads the viewers eye to the foreground where we find our logger walking along a bridge, axe slung over his shoulder.

This painting is a beautiful rendering of daily life in 19th century Australia, one which is typical of Turner's great skill, eye and style. His obituary in The Argus Melbourne on 16 April 1908 read in part "Victoria loses an artist who not only understood and appreciated the beauty of the bush, but could depict faithfully its life and character."