Group show
Traces of the Wake: The Etching Revival in Britain and Beyond
curated by David Maskill and his ARTH 403 students
02 October – 18 December 2015
Traces of the Wake brought together more than 60 original prints from private and public collections by British, Australian, French and New Zealand artists working between 1850 and 1930 who were at the vanguard of what has come to be known as The Etching Revival. David Maskill and his Honours’ students delved into this neglected period, when printmakers produced finely crafted prints for an eager market of fine art connoisseurs and a middle-class hungry for traditional subjects in a world that was rapidly changing. The exhibition was structured around the works of three master etchers—Rembrandt, Charles Meryon, and James Abbott McNeill Whistler—who were invoked by the Etching Revivalists as source and inspiration. It examined ‘traces’ of their legacy in the subjects, styles and processes that were carried over in the practices of British artists such as Muirhead Bone, David Young Cameron, and Francis Seymour Hayden; Australians such as Lionel Lindsay and Mortimer Menpes, and New Zealanders: Harry Linley Richardson, Trevor Lloyd, Mina Arndt, and Frederick Vincent Ellis.
The exhibition was accompanied by an illustrated catalogue featuring essays by each student that elaborate on the exhibition.
The Adam Art Gallery gratefully acknowledges the support and assistance of staff of the lending institutions: Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Alexander Turnbull Library, Sarjeant Gallery Te Whare o Rehua, and Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki.
This exhibition was staged concurrently with Bruce Barber: Performance Scores and Fragments of a World.
Installation view, Traces of the Wake: The Etching Revival in Britain and Beyond, curated by David Maskill and his ARTH 403 students, Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, Victoria University of Wellington, 2015. Photo: Shaun Waugh
Installation view, Traces of the Wake: The Etching Revival in Britain and Beyond, curated by David Maskill and his ARTH 403 students, Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, Victoria University of Wellington, 2015. Photo: Shaun Waugh
Installation view, Traces of the Wake: The Etching Revival in Britain and Beyond, curated by David Maskill and his ARTH 403 students, Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, Victoria University of Wellington, 2015. Photo: Shaun Waugh
Installation view, Traces of the Wake: The Etching Revival in Britain and Beyond, curated by David Maskill and his ARTH 403 students, Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, Victoria University of Wellington, 2015. Photo: Shaun Waugh
Frank Brangwyn, The Pont Neuf, 1916, etching, drypoint and aquatint, private collection
Installation view, Traces of the Wake: The Etching Revival in Britain and Beyond, curated by David Maskill and his ARTH 403 students, Adam Art Gallery Te Pātaka Toi, Victoria University of Wellington, 2015. Photo: Shaun Waugh
Ernest Heber Thompson, All change 1930, etching and drypoint, collection of Te Papa Tongarewa. Gift of Sir John Ilott, 1952
Harry Linley Richardson, Wellington from Kelburn near Bowling Green 1916, etching, Alexander Turnbull Library
Robert Demachy, Landscape c,1890-1914, gum bichromate photograph. Collection of Sarjeant Gallery Te Whare o Rehua
Rembrandt Harmensz van Rijn, Woman bathing her feet at a brook 1658, etching, Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Gift of Sir John Ilott, 1952