The National Gallery of Victoria does the annual Winter Masterpieces show but commercial galleries are getting into the poetic of the seasons as well.
Freddie Wright is the co-curator of The Last of the Summer Blue at the Lennox St Gallery in Richmond. Gone are the post-lockdown days of buyers snapping up large works from solo shows.
The Last of the Summer Blue is a group show aimed at reaching out to the art community with a poetic approach to the end of summer.
Local artist Melinda Harper has six works in the exhibition, some of them softer versions of her hard-edge abstractions. “March is a cooling down, a bit more meditative after a brash summer,” says Wright. “It’s not super extrovert.”
Harper’s works are not exactly retiring but she has introduced more flowing lines in the undated paintings from her studio.
Lennox St Gallery is a remake of Metro Gallery in Malvern, known for its blockbuster shows, and this one is more contemplative.
The gallery shifted into a Richmond landmark, the Hellas Cake building, with a quite a fanfare in 2021 then had to deal with the impact of the lockdown which has changed the face of the art scene.
The first shows at the Richmond gallery were ones rescheduled because of the closure when the “idea of big, sold-out shows post-covid,” was still current.
“Now there’s been a shift in commercial galleries to group exhibitions,” Wright says. “Collectors are going for small-scale works. It’s an exciting time.”
Others in the Summer Blue show include Claudia Terstappen, Kate Rhode, Carissa Karamarko, Matthew Johnson and Marie Hagerty.
Wright admits that Modernist-inspired works are collectible at the moment and Harper has been in at least three exhibitions this year, including at Gertrude Contemporary and Linden.
She had her first solo show at Gertrude Street Gallery in 1992 and her style is remarkably consistent. She shows the same penchant for bold colour combinations and stripes, with beautiful interruptions to the main rhythm.
In the ‘90s a black shape might interfere or a largish square. In the more recent works, the interruptions by small squares and stutters are more subtle.
Perhaps they show the relaxed days of autumn as they are heralded in, or the eel season of the Wurundjeri calendar as it meanders into view.
The Last of the Summer Blue
Lennox St Gallery, 322 Lennox Street, Richmond
Exhibition continues to 29 March 2025
Free entry
For more information. visit: www.lennoxst.gallery for details.
Image: Curator Freddie Wright in the presence of a Harper – photo by Rhonda Dredge
Words: Rhonda Dredge