Exposed: Art & the Naked Body
South Italian amphora, 400–375 BC (detail)
Curated by Dr Michael Turner
From 4 January 2011
For most of us, the question 'what's the difference between a naked body and a nude?' is puzzling, and the difference hard to articulate.
In a famous definition, the art historian Kenneth Clark suggested that: 'To be naked is to be deprived of our clothes, and the word implies some of the embarrassment most of us feel in that condition. The word ‘nude’ on the other hand, carries, in educated usage, no uncomfortable overtone. The vague image it projects into the mind is not of a huddled and defenceless body, but of a balanced, prosperous, and confident body: the body re-formed. In fact, the word was forced into our vocabulary by critics of the early eighteenth century to persuade the artless islanders that, in countries where painting and sculpture were practiced and valued as they should be, the naked human body was the central subject of art.'. (The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form, 1956)
The exhibition Exposed: Art & the Naked Body brings together 75 nude/naked works from the collection of the Hon. Roddy Meagher, from the Power Collection, and from the University Art Collection. Selected Greek pottery and sculpture of 'naked' figures as well as a life-size early 19th century French anatomical
model of a woman, intriguingly posed as the Medici Venus, are included to explore the concept of nakedness and nudity.
Artists represented include Matisse, Renoir, Picasso, Cocteau, Rodin, Henry Moore, Brett Whiteley, John Power, Ian Fairweather, Donald Friend, Arthur Boyd, Sydney Nolan, James Gleeson and many many more as well as the unnamed artists of four exquisite examples of naked Greek art.
@ Matt.
