Academic literature on the topic 'Eugene von Guérard'

The colonial artist Eugene von Guérard travelled extensively throughout south-eastern Australia sketching thousands of views during his three-decade-long sojourn in Australia. His field drawings are renowned for their fidelity to nature and observational accuracy, but the validity of the latter claim depends on comparing drawings with the view at the sites where he sketched. The location of the view in some artworks, such as Mount Kosciusko, seen from the Victorian Border, has eluded art historians and aficionados who have ventured into the field. This article discusses the collation of clues from historical narratives, maps and surveying techniques to limit the search area for the vantage point where he sketched the view on which he based his painting of the Kosciuszko massif. Novel use of spatial technology utilising satellite imagery, Global Positioning System (GPS) and Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) data, particularly digital elevation models, to locate the actual site is explored, and the topographical accuracy of his sketches evaluated when compared with photographs taken from close to the site. Finally, the potential value of using spatial technology in art history field work is discussed.

When the leading mid-nineteenth-century landscape artist in Victoria, Eugene von Guérard, was criticised for failing to illustrate nature sublimely, he replied that his “greatest desire” was to “imitate nature” as far as it was “compatible with the effect of the picture.” Later, he asserted that his aim was “to be true to nature as far as possible” in his art. This empirical, science-informed thesis explores what being “true to nature” meant in Guérard’s practice by examining natural features typically illustrated with fidelity, scrutinising features freely transformed for artistic effect, and assessing whether such transformations compromise his aesthetic ideal. The fieldwork-based study addresses a knowledge gap in Australian art history and environmental history by adopting a multi-disciplinary approach. The findings make a significant contribution to understanding what being “true to nature” meant for Guérard, and to determining whether his landscapes are reliable environmental history records. The investigation uses a mixed-method approach, combining qualitative and quantitative techniques. Early in-depth case studies identified faithfully rendered and freely modified features, which informed the development of an innovative survey instrument used to evaluate the fidelity of over a hundred of Guérard’s Antipodean landscapes. The extent to which natural features are faithful or transformed is subjectively assessed by comparing them with his accurate field drawings and modern site photographs taken from his vantage points. The novel reverse use of digital elevation models enabled many of his vantage points at sites to be precisely determined. Statistical analysis of survey data and further case studies leads to the conclusion that Guérard practised selective fidelity to nature. Although no natural feature was totally immune to being modified for artistic effect, many features are typically reproduced with great fidelity to the natural scenery visible at the site. Features significantly altered to create visually engaging or dramatic landscapes are usually found to be true to the natural history of the location, if not necessarily to the view. Exceptions are largely restricted to the composite landscapes that field research uncovered. Finally, the thesis examines whether Guérard’s fidelity practice resonates with particular purported influences, or parallels the practices of international contemporaries who were also renowned for their wilderness paintings.
Doctor of Philosophy