Robert Jacks

For the American film producer, see Robert L. Jacks. For the actor, see Robert Jacks (actor).

Robert Jacks
Born8 March 1943
Melbourne, Australia
Died14 August 2014(2014-08-14) (aged 71)
Castlemaine, Victoria, Australia
NationalityAustralian
EducationRMIT University
Known forPainting
MovementAbstract
AwardsOrder of Australia

Robert Jacks AO (8 March 1943, Melbourne – 14 August 2014, Castlemaine) was an award-winning Australian painter, sculptor and printmaker and acknowledged as one of Australia's leading abstract artists.[1]

Early life and career

Jacks was born in Melbourne, Australia and after a brief stint as a boxer began studying sculpture from 1958 to 1960 at the Prahran Technical College, Melbourne, then painting in 1961 and 1962 at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (now RMIT University).[2][3]

In 1966 he had his first solo exhibition at Gallery A, Melbourne from which a work was purchased for the collection of the National Gallery of Victoria. In 1968, he participated in The Field, held at the new National Gallery of Victoria building in St Kilda Road, an influential exhibition which effectively launched color field abstraction in Australia.[3]

He taught at Rochedale College, Toronto, before moving to a studio at 96 Greene Street, Soho in 1969,[4][5] where he associated with Melbourne expatriate John Stringer at the Museum of Modern Art, artists John Davis, Ian Burn, Mel Ramsden and the gallerist Max Hutchison,[6] as well as American minimalist and avant-garde artists such as Sol LeWitt and Brice Marden.[2] Ian Burn noted in September 1970, that Jacks’ ‘recent work in New York has moved beyond painting into conceptualized presentation of numeral systems and serial techniques’.[7]

Jacks returned to Melbourne in 1978 to be artist-in-residence at the University of Melbourne.[8]

The winner of many art awards and prizes, he has exhibited consistently in Australia since 1966 in more than 50 solo exhibitions, including retrospectives. In 2001 the Bendigo Art Gallery established the Robert Jacks Drawing Prize.[9] In 2006, he was named an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO).

His mature work, while emerging out of the international abstract 'color field' movement of the late '60s, retains an ambiguous link to the representation of appearances, especially of objects in space.

"I think my work has always been minimal and abstract because when I was being taught sculpture, it was expressed in abstract terms. Form in space, mass and volume - that sort of thing. Painting, for me, is an extension of sculptural ideas."

In the latter part of his life Jack lived in Harcourt, and died from complications of asthma at Castlemaine Hospital.[10][11]

Collections

Further reading

  • Patrick McCaughey (2001) 'Gallery notes', Australian Book Review, September.
  • Sonia Payes (2007) 'Untitled. Portraits of Australian Artists' published by Macmillan Art Publishing.
  • Grant, Rozentals and Anderson (2014)'Robert Jacks - Order and Variation' NGV Exhibition
  • Ken McGregor & Robert Jacks (2001) Robert Jacks: Past Unfolded, Fine Art Publishing
  • David Thomas (2003) 'Underwater garden', Metro 5 Gallery, exhibition catalogue

References

  1. ^ "Once abstract, always abstract". The Age. Retrieved 25 October 2024.
  2. ^ a b "Robert Jacks". British Museum. Retrieved 18 August 2024.
  3. ^ a b Jacks, Robert; Anderson, Peter; Grant, Kirsty; Rozentals, Beckett (2014). Robert Jacks : order and variation. Melbourne, Victoria: National Gallery of Victoria.
  4. ^ Morano, Kathy (January 1996). "A little history, a big thing: 20 years of the Greene Street Studio in NY. One of the studios in the Australia Council's Overseas Studio Residency Program". Object (3). Sydney (published 1996): 20–24. ISSN 1038-1856.
  5. ^ Jacks, Robert (1969). # 187 (artist's book ed.). New York, , N.Y. 10012: New York: 96 Greene Street., N.Y. 10012.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location (link)
  6. ^ Sanders, Anne E. (November 2009). "The Heroic Years of Mildura Part 1: 1970 – 1974". The Mildura Sculpture Triennials 1961 – 1978: an interpretative history (dissertation ed.). Canberra: Australian National University. pp. 187, 188, 189, 189 n.384, 191.
  7. ^ Burn, Ian (September 1970). "Conceptual Art as Art". Art and Australia. 8 (2): 170.
  8. ^ "Robert Jacks AO, b. 1943". National Portrait Gallery people. Retrieved 18 August 2024.
  9. ^ "Robert Jacks Drawing Prize 2006". Bendigo Art Gallery. Retrieved 18 August 2024.
  10. ^ Death Notices (18 August 2014). "Robert Jacks AO". The Age. Melbourne.
  11. ^ Stephens, Andrew (26 September 2014). "Order and Variation: the Robert Jacks retrospective at the NGV is inspiring". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 18 September 2021.
  12. ^ "Robert Jacks, Goddess". Castlemaine Art Museum Collection Online. Retrieved 18 September 2021.


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