Lot 14

The artwork has been sighted outside of its current frame (photos provided upon request). The original sheet has been laid onto a secondary sheet. This has not occurred recently, and was likely done to stabilize the sheet. Some minor abrasions are visible only upon very close inspection and there is some minor discolouration apparent as with age. Overall framed size 47 x 51cm.


The opinions expressed in the condition reports are a guide only and should not be treated as a statement of fact. Prospective buyers are encouraged to seek further information or request additional images during our pre-sale period where Leonard Joel staff are available for advice. Please note condition reports can be amended during the pre-sale period, so we strongly suggest any interested bidders check the published condition report available on the website before the auction commences. Leonard Joel makes no guarantee of the originality of mechanical or applied components. Absence of reference to such modifications does not imply that a lot is free from modifications.

Sotheby's, Sydney, 17 November 1988, lot 142
The Collection of Colin Lanceley
Leonard Joel, The Estate of Colin Lanceley, Sydney, 16 November 2015, lot 202
Private collection, Sydney

First Exhibition of Linocuts, The Redfern Gallery, London 1929, cat. no. 41 (another example)
A Group of Seven, Macquarie Galleries, Sydney 1930, cat. no. 26 (another example)
Drawing, Print and Watercolour, Contemporary Artist's Society, Adelaide 1952, cat. no. 9 (another example)
A Survey of Australian Relief Prints 1900-1950, Deutscher Galleries, 13 April - 5 May, 1978, cat. no 124 (another example)
Dorrit Black Collection, Josef Lebovic Gallery, Sydney 1999, cat. no. 3 (another example)
Out of the Darkness: Prints and Drawings from the University of Western Australia Art Collection, Lawrence Wilson Art Gallery, Perth 2010 (another example)
Dorrit Black: Retrospective Exhibition, Royal South Australian Society of Arts, Adelaide 2011, cat. no. 15 (another example)
Dorrit Black: Unseen Forces, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 14 June - 7 September 2014 (another example)

Lock, T., Dorrit Black Unseen Forces, Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide, 2017, p. 50, 152, 200 (illustrated, another example)
Butler, R. & Deutscher, C., A Survey of Australian Relief Prints 1900-1950, Deutscher Galleries, Melbourne, 1978, p. 93 (illustrated, another example)

Dorrit Black was at the forefront of the modernist movement, and a key participant in bringing these ideas to Australia from Europe in the 1920s.
Leaving Adelaide for England in 1927, Dorrit Black attended the Grosvenor School of Modern Art in London to study under Claude Flight three days a week. Flight took great interest in Black's rhythmic use of colour and suggested using a multi lino-block to refine the build-up of colour within each print, a technique executed by only his most advanced students.
Having forged a great relationship, Flight and Black kept in close contact even after Black had departed London to travel around Europe. The pair would write to each other about their learnings and exchange concepts, with Flight even displaying her works amongst his own and that of other students.
Joining her Australian comrades, Grace Crowley and Anne Dangar, Black enrolled in the Academie Lhote on Rue d'Odessa in Montparnasse. Intrigued by the aims and methods of the Cubist Modernist Movement, Black was eager to work with teacher Andre Lhote, one of the original Cubist artists. In the late 1920s, Black travelled through Europe, spending three weeks in Taormina, Sicily. This is where Black would produce some of her most prolific works blending the modern printmaking teachings of Flight with the Cubist perspectives of Lhote.
"The Castle, Taormina" demonstrates volume and solidity through the advanced overlaying of colour and the dramatic vertical forms and shadows. Rather than the use of thick black outline, Dorrit expertly balances her use of block colour and integrates shadowing and depth through segmented line to depict the angled surface of the landscape. Dorrit successfully represents the towering heights of the Sicilian mountains and the dramatic formations of cloud in the sky, dissecting her subject into a balanced and striking modernist composition. Her geometric depiction and patterning of the landscape is a great example of her experimentation with modern methods and her complete adherence to the principles she had recently learnt.
In 1929, Claude Flight held the First Exhibition of British Linocuts at Redfern Gallery, London. Five linocuts by Black had been selected, including "The Castle, Taormina". Flight wrote to Black: "let me congratulate you on your prints they are wholly delightful & the ones I like especially are 'music' (wings), and the landscape (The Castle, Taormina). The landscape is the best lino landscape I have seen yet - I wish I had done it myself".

Hannah Ryan, Art Specialist

RELATED WORK:
The Castle, Taormina, 1928, oil on canvasboard, 54 x 37cm, University Art Collection, The University of Sydney, Sydney.