REVIEW: The Nicholas Building “Up Late” by Helen Hughes

Many thanks to Stephen Mclaughlan for forwarding the following review of THE NICHOLAS BUILDING “UP LATE” in the online arts publication, MeMo. 

Here are a couple of snippets, by way of an introduction:

THE NICHOLAS BUILDING “UP LATE” Helen Hughes 

MeMo, 19 Feb 2022

⬤ 99%, BLINDSIDE, CAVES, Joseph Beuys Cafe, Stephen McLaughlan Gallery 16 Feb - 16 Feb 2022 

Those who prefer their art galleries stacked one on top of each other—as opposed to sprawled out, Sexpo style, at the Convention Centre—would do well to visit the Nicholas Building, where several art spaces opened their doors to punters on Wednesday night as part of Melbourne Art Fair’s “Up Late” program. Queuing for the lift in the Cathedral Arcade, I was quick to encounter Dario—a charismatic member of the Nicholas Building Association—who advised that the best way to “do the building” was to take the lift up to the ninth floor and wend your way down. Part of the lifeblood of the building, he was mysteriously omnipresent all evening—coursing through lifts, stairwells, hallways; putting up posters, snapping pics, gabbing with tenants.

The building is a genuinely social place and the community it houses is real…

My works in ATTUNED at Stephen Mclaughlan Gallery even got a mention: 

… At Stephen McLaughlan Gallery (also a Nicholas Building stalwart, McLaughlan having kept a space there for almost thirty years), Deborah Klein’s haunting paintings of the backs of women’s heads were a standout.

To read the full review, click on the link below: 

https://memoreview.net/reviews/the-nicholas-building-up-late-by-helen-hughes?fbclid=IwAR1ybcSYgBsRHeRB_gTeMczZJWAf7yHbJZriotjZv1IkmJJlBfqsvSYCVOA

Thanks also to Helen Hughes for her kind words and for championing the incomparable Nicholas Building. 

ATTUNED is in its final days. The exhibition concludes on Saturday 26 February at 5 pm. Gallery hours are below:

ATTUNED 

Curated by Stephen Mclaughlan

Stephen McLaughlan Gallery 

Level 8 Room 16 Nicholas Building 37 Swanston Street Melbourne 3000

On the corner of Flinders Lane

T: 0407 317 323     E: st73599@bigpond.net.au 

www.stephenmclaughlangallery.com.au

Gallery Hours: Wednesday to Friday 1pm-5pm. Saturday 11am-5pm.

& by appointment

Reminder: UP LATE 2022 Gallery Night

ATTUNED, curated by Stephen McLaughlan, is a considered snapshot of the Gallery zeitgeist – an opportunity for 8 of our artists to “strut their stuff” in fine coalition. Such exhibitions are a traditional opener for us and a perfect “introduction” to the Gallery. We look forward to welcoming you.

GALLERY NIGHT is presented as part of the Broadsheet LATE NIGHTS program, and is supported by City of Melbourne through the Events Partnership Program (EPP).

- From the Melbourne Art Fair website.

Happening tomorrow, Wednesday, 16 February, 6 - 8 pm, at Stephen McLaughlan Gallery:

A special nighttime viewing of ATTUNED, part of NICHOLAS BUILDING UP LATE, in partnership with Melbourne Art Fair. Featuring Laszlo Romer, Jenny Loft, Felicity Spear, Elizabeth Banfield, Peter Rowe, Irene Barberis, Callum Jackson and myself.

Other participating art spaces in NICHOLAS BUILDING UP LATE 2022 Gallery Night: 

GIANT SWAN, JILL KEMPSON, BIBLIOPATH, LEVEL 917-922 STUDIOS, JOSEPH BEUYS CAFE, MISSING PERSONS, CAVES GALLERY, MELBOURNE ART LIBRARY, 99% GALLERY, JOANNE MORRIS ARTIST STUDIOS and BLINDSIDE.

Do drop by if you can. Personally, I reckon the only thing more fascinating than the iconic, heritage-listed Nicholas Building by day is the Nicholas Building by night.

Pictured top: Philonist, 16 x 11 cm, pigmented drawing ink, one of my contributions to ATTUNED.

ATTUNED installation views: courtesy Stephen Mclaughlan.

For further information, please find your NICHOLAS BUILDING UP LATE invitation below. Alternatively, scroll down to our Blog Post of Friday, 11 February, or go HERE.

NICHOLAS BUILDING UP LATE 2022 - a Melbourne Art Fair Satellite Event

The group show, ATTUNED, is part of an exciting Melbourne Art Fair satellite event: a nocturnal viewing of selected Melbourne art spaces. Among them are the galleries in the Nicholas Building, including Stephen Mclaughlan Gallery. Visit the link below and scroll down for the listing under ALL EVENTS. Click on the image for further information. (It’s the ninth item, third row from the top):

https://melbourneartfair.com.au/2022-program/.

The special viewing at Stephen Mclaughlan Gallery will take place on the evening of Wednesday February 16, from 6 - 8 pm, the night before Melbourne Art Fair commences its 4 day run. 

Pictured top is an overview of my nine drawings that are part of ATTUNED. Directly above is a still life snapped in Stephen’s gallery, with the event details captured on his laptop. 

ATTUNED artists comprise Laszlo Romer, Jenny Loft, Felicity Spear, Elizabeth Banfield, Peter Rowe, Irene Barberis, Callum Jackson and myself. 

Your invitation to UP LATE 2022 GALLERY NIGHT at the Nicholas Building is below: 

Click on images for enlarged views.

The gallery’s daytime hours are below:

ATTUNED - current to February 26

Curated by Stephen Mclaughlan 

Stephen Mclaughlan Gallery

ABN 93 265 950 324

Level 8 Room 16 Nicholas Building 37 Swanston Street Melbourne 3000

On the corner of Flinders Lane

T: 0407 317 323     E: st73599@bigpond.net.au 

www.stephenmclaughlangallery.com.au

Gallery Hours: Wednesday to Friday 1pm-5pm. Saturday 11am-5pm.

& by appointment

MIFF, Melbourne Art Fair and Resonance

As of yesterday evening, the Melbourne International Film Festival is over for another year. I always feel a bit sad to see it end, especially when I’ve enjoyed it as much as I did this one*. It’s the one of the few times of the year that I give myself permission for a little guilt-free time off work. But with several deadlines looming, needs must; I brought a pile of homo-insecta linocuts with me to Melbourne, intending to hand colour them in between trips to the cinema and on the rare days we didn’t have a film to go to. It worked out surprisingly well; MIFF became a sound structure around which I was able to create an effortless and satisfying balance between work and play.

The hand colouring was completed somewhat ahead of the time I’d allotted for it (see August 10 blog post) and so I seized the opportunity to continue with the fledgling homo-insecta watercolours. By the festival’s end two more of these were nearly completed. The finishing touches to the second were applied earlier today. (Both will feature in future posts).  

But it hasn’t all been MIFF and work. On Saturday afternoon Shane and I drove to Maroondah Art Gallery to see Resonance, Craig Gough’s dazzling solo exhibition (is there another living colourist as fine as he?) At 2 pm Craig gave an informal, entertaining and enlightening floor talk, which, thanks to his enthusiastic audience, generated into a lively discussion specifically about his work and broader issues including abstraction versus figuration and acrylics versus oil paint.

From left: Craig Gough's Primary and Spacial Blue, both 2013, acrylic on canvas 

Back in the dim, distant 1980s, Craig was one of my painting and drawing lecturers at uni. Many post-art school years afterwards, and several MIFFs ago, we recognized Craig and his partner, artist Wendy Stavrianos queuing next to us at the Forum Cinema for Agnes Varda’s The Gleaners and I (2000). I hadn’t seen Craig since my graduation and it was our first meeting with Wendy. We had a great natter that night (I seem to remember the previous screening was running overtime). Coincidentally, some weeks later Shane and I were curated into an exhibition with Wendy at Charles Nodrum Gallery: The Painted Fold. It gave us anther opportunity to connect with she and Craig – and so an enduring and treasured friendship was born.

Wendy Stavrianos offers a Turkish Delight to an appropriately delighted Shane Jones.
Background, left-right: Maroondah Art Gallery Curator Lisa Byrne, Craig Gough and Assistant Curator Clinton Greenwood

Wendy, Lisa and Craig

Coinciding with the film festival was the biennial Melbourne Art Fair, which we visited on the last day, prior to the early evening screening of our last MIFF film.

The art overload begins. Photo credit: Shane Jones

I must admit to having mixed feelings about the Art Fair. To my knowledge, Art Overload has never actually killed, or even hospitalized anyone, but feel certain there must have been some close calls. Still and all, we really enjoyed the experience this time around. These days I have my head down in the Ballarat studio and lead a comparatively isolated existence; the fair provided an opportunity to see a great deal of what is out there under one enormous roof. Inevitably we bumped into several acquaintances and friends, including Polixeni Papapetrou, Godwin Bradbeer, Jackie Hocking, Rachel Hancock, Margaret Snowden, Adriane Strampp and Peter Lancaster. Stopping periodically for amiable conversation broke up the time, effectively preventing a potentially fatal art overdose.

Shane takes a breather before taking on the second level

I even bought an artwork, from Arts Project, one of our favourite stands: a wonderful drawing by Bobby Kryiakopoulos of the Wicked Witch of the West, as portrayed by Margaret Hamilton in the move The Wizard of Oz.

For the first time, there were two adjuncts to the Art Fair, the Not Fair (which we didn’t get to, although the venue, the Grace Darling Hotel, is fairly local to us) and Spring.1883 at the Hotel Windsor, which featured 20 galleries, each exhibiting in suites over four floors, a brilliant, fun, creatively challenging idea that was wholeheartedly embraced by all the galleries concerned. 

Our last MIFF movie was The Great Museum, a documentary about the famous Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, its extraordinary collection and the people who work there. So the twin themes of visual art and film finally converged and our marvelous MIFF fortnight ended on a perfect note.

Pictured below: our favourite après movie hangout: the Festival Lounge at the fabulous Forum Theatre.

*Our 2014 MIFF movies:

Life Itself

The Vanquishing of the Witch Baba Yaga

An Honest Liar

Sepideh – Reaching for the Stars

The Story of my Death

The Galapagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden

Rhomer in Paris

Iranian

Jauja

Trespassing Bergman

The Great Museum

Baal

Amour Fou