Australian Women Artists

The Podcast

Ep 29 Anne Ryan on artist Lesley Dumbrell

I was very lucky to have had the opportunity to have a fabulous conversation with Anne Ryan on the incredible Australian artist, Lesley Dumbrell. 

 Anne Ryan is one of Australia's leading art curators. She serves as Curator of Australian Art at the Art Gallery of New South Wales, where she oversees the prestigious collection of Australian prints, drawings and watercolours. She pursued her studies at the Univ. of Syd and NSW and served as the Sarah & William Holmes Scholar in the Depts of Prints & Drawings at the British Museum. 

 Anne has curated various exhibitions and publications focusing on historical and contemporary Australian art and artists with a particular interest in women artists. Amongst many other things, she has curated the annual Archibald, Wynne, and Sulman Prizes eight times since 2015. 

 Lesley Dumbrell is a pioneering abstract painter celebrated for her precise geometric abstract paintings and mastery of colour and rhythm. Over more than five decades, she has forged her own path in a male-dominated genre, becoming a leading figure in the country’s abstraction movement and a passionate advocate for women in art, notably co-founding the Women’s Art Register in 1976 which archives living female artists. 

 Lesley’s work explores the dynamic interplay between colour, perception, and environment, and is held in major national collections, including the National Gallery of Australia and the Art Gallery of New South Wales. 

 She very recently, at age 82, attended her first comprehensive solo exhibition at AGNSW...her first survey in a state art museum – curated by none other than my guest, Anne Ryan.

 It’s a fabulous insight and Anne was fortunate enough to have spent a great deal of time with Lesley in putting not only the exhibition Thrum together, but the amazing book that accompanied that exhibition. 

Head to the link in my bio to find the podcast.

Images – supplied by AGNSW

1.   LD 

2.   Solstice, 1974 liquitex on canvas, 173x296

3.   Spangle, 1977 liquitex on canvas 149x210

4.   Columbine, 2008 liquitex on canvas 172x228