And the beat goes on...

Ann Newmarch
Australia
1945 – 2022

And the beat goes on...
from the series Cultural pattern and human fragility (Pandora's box)
2015
pigment print
Place made
Prospect, Adelaide
Medium
pigment print
Dimensions
54.4 x 37.8 cm (image)
56.0 x 37.8 cm (sheet)
Credit line
Gift of the family of Ann Newmarch 2024
Accession number
20243G19
Signature and date
Signed l.r., black fibre-tipped pen “Newmarch” Not dated.
Provenance
The artist; by descent to Jessie Kerr, the artist’s daughter.
Collection area
Australian Prints
Copyright
Courtesy the artist
Image credit
Photo: Stewart Adams

  • Ann Newmarch began the series Cultural pattern and human fragility (Pandora’s box) in 2008 after being diagnosed with cancer and completed the series while she was recovering.  Her ill health and brush with mortality brought about a new way of working where she worked quickly and intuitively collaging together elements drawn from her years of collecting and thinking.  As she said: “It’s haptic in a way – I know what the possibilities are but I don’t know the end result in advance.  I have to trust myself to know what I am doing.  It is both a rational response as well as an emotional one”.  When you look beneath the patterning of the shapes and forms, many of the images reference war and also peace, media and found imagery, children’s drawings, remnants of fabric, aspects of her life and health, and lyrics from songs by John Lennon or Leonard Cohen.  The small collages were enlarged as digital prints on canvas, and also on paper.

    Julie Robinson, Senior Curator, Prints, Drawings & Photographs (2024)

     
     

  • Ann Newmarch was a significant and influential figure in the arts in South Australia for over fifty years and, while best known for her screenprints, her practice also encompassed paintings, drawings, photographs, sculpture, union banners, murals and community art projects. Her artistic practice was underpinned by a strength of conviction and rebellious streak, which saw her challenge conventions and break down many barriers in the art world. Recognised as a trailblazing feminist artist, she created works of art that tackled important political and social issues from the perspective of a woman and a mother.

    During the 1970s Newmarch rose to prominence in Adelaide as a founding and influential member of several collectives in Adelaide, including the Progressive Art Movement (1974–77), the Women’s Art Movement (1976–84) and the Prospect Mural Group (1978 – 84). Her works addressed issues such as the Vietnam War, the struggle of workers, uranium mining, and Australian independence from American influence. By the late 1970s her involvement in the women’s movement and her role as a mother of two young boys, saw the subject matter of women’s issues and motherhood/childhood taking a greater prominence in her oeuvre. Many of her works were created as screenprints, which could be made quickly and in large editions, enabling her ideas to reach a broad audience, beyond the traditional confines of gallery walls. Newmarch was also an influential teacher and inspiration to many other artists, both through her role as lecturer at the South Australian School of Art (1969 – 2000) and through her leadership in community art projects,  articularly in Prospect, where she made murals and initiated the practice of Stobie pole paintings.

    In 1997 Newmarch was the first living female artist to have a retrospective exhibition at AGSA, The Personal is Political, and her work is widely represented in Australian national and state collections. Newmarch is also recognised internationally – being represented in the collection of the British Museum, London, and in 2007 her work was exhibited in Los Angeles and New York in the ground-breaking exhibition WACK! Art and the Feminist Revolution, a global survey of feminist art. Newmarch, who was represented by nine works, was the only Australian artist included. In 2021 Newmarch’s work was celebrated in KNOW MY NAME: Australian Women Artists from 1900 to now at the National Gallery of Australia.

    A distinguished print-maker, photographer, painter and sculptor, in 1989 Newmarch received an Order of Australia Medal for her significant contributions to art and culture in this country.

    Julie Robinson, Senior Curator, Prints, Drawings & Photographs (2024)

  • Cultural Pattern and Human Fragility [Pandora’s Box]

    FUMA, 3 July 2010 – 29 August 2010