Provenance:
The Estate of Sir Sidney Nolan

Exhibited:
Rebels and Precursors, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Art Gallery of New South
Wales, Sydney, 1962 (63), no. 63
Nolan’s Nolans: A Reputation Reassessed, Agnew’s, London, 11 June - 25 July 1997, cat. no.17

Literature:
Nolan’s Nolans: A Reputation Reassessed, Agnew’s, London, 1997 (cat. no.17)

Nolan’s vivid St Kilda paintings convey his love of the beach, where he once “spent all day and much of the night - it was university, gymnasium, everything combined.” As this series shows, he often indirectly expressed personal experiences in his works: “he always loved all kinds of energetic physical activity and was, like his father before him, a member of the lifesaving team on the beach … As with other larger paintings of the St Kilda period, the main stylistic catalyst for these paintings was his sophisticated understanding of children’s art. Linking directly with subject matter deriving from intense childhood memories their effect is far from being naive however and, for all their high spirits, the final sensation they convey is profoundly touching.”1

This work was previously framed together as a block of four with three other St Kilda beach scenes.2
AL

1Usherwood. N., Nolan’s Nolans: A Reputation Reassessed, Agnew’s, London, 1997, cat. no.17
2 ibid