Submitted by aarAdmin on Fri, 11/21/2025 - 08:36
So striking was John Brack’s (1920-1999) The Club 1989 (lot 17) on Menzies showroom wall prior to its November 19 auction at 1 Darling Street, South Yarra, it was no surprise that it topped the sale listings at $638,182 (including buyer’s premium) once the last of the 101 paintings on offer had been knocked down to an eager buyer.
Brack is extremely popular and his works, when they appear on the secondary market, rarely fail to sell.
The Club, painted five years prior to his last efforts and 10 years before he died, sparked many animated discussions at the special brunch invitation viewing day (Sunday) and was a key work appearing on the 1989 exhibition catalogue back cover at Melbourne’s Tolano Galleries display devoted to his paintings.
Unlike his early works, Brack was keen to examine how unstable society had become – The Club being a leading exponent of this with its antagonistic arrangement of such a primitive weapon.
Yan Yean Swamp 1972 (lot 15) by Fred Williams (1927-1982) filled third place in the top 10 paintings, changing hands for $319,091, and is seen as an important step in the artist’s lifelong quest to find new ways of depicting the Australian landscape.
Another landscape, entitled Fading Light, Springbrook to Beechmont 2002 (lot 14) by William Robinson (1936-2025), sold for almost as much at $306,818.
The work shows how his painting technique for landscapes had evolved over almost 20 years when he first began recording the subtropical rainforests of southeast Queensland after he and his wife Shirley purchased a rural property in 1984 at Beechmont in the Gold Coast hinterland.
Arthur Boyd’s (1920-1999) Laycock’s Jetty 1957 (lot 68) brought $294,545. A masterwork by one of Australia’s best known and admired artists, the painting depicts one of his favourite Mornington Peninsula beachside locations southeast of Melbourne.
A major example of his peninsula works, it was first owned by the Laycock family before going in the early 2000s to English collectors Frank and Janet South who migrated in 1961 to Australia.
Although Sidney Nolan’s (1917-1992) highly rated work Bridge Crossing 1963-64 (lot 18) – owned for 60 years by the late Sydney barrister and art dealer Clive Andreas Evatt (1931-2018) – failed to sell at auction, it was the only painting to be snapped up after the sale for $613,636.
Another of his works entitled Camel and Man (Burke and Wills) c1966 (lot 69) changed hands for $159,545.
This was one of the many paintings Nolan produced top mark the tragic exploratory expedition, comprising 19 men, beginning in 1860 from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria in Australia’s north.
Leaders Robert O’Hara Burke and William John Wills perished on the return journey, largely because of their poor preparation and management and the extremely difficult terrain and weather conditions.
Renowned Aboriginal artist Albert Namatjira (1902-1959) chimed in with Mount Gillen, Western McDonnell Ranges c1952 (lot 9) at $135,000 – well above its catalogue estimate of $30,000-$50,000.
The watercolourist is the most famous member of the Hermannsburg School of Art near Alice Springs in the Northern Territory.
Born in 1949, Tim Storrier is always a popular pickup – and his Enngonia Constellation III 2007 (lot 16) didn’t disappoint at $110,455, the same price as that paid for Tom Roberts (1856-1931) Study for Portrait of Philip Gidley King 1894, third Governor of New South Wales.
