Recent Paintings: Dale Frank
Complex galaxies of brilliant colour react into each other in Dale Frank's enigmatic abstractions. Laden surfaces reveal the expressive potential of paint but the fluid and lyrical nature of his canvases belie the calculated science of his painting practice.
Acutely aware of the changing malleability of his materials Frank pours layers of varnish upon each other at varying stages of its transformation from liquid to solid. By tilting and moving the canvas the liquids coalesce and, depending on the relative stages in the drying process, the colours blend or separate forming swirling liquid patterns.
Dale Frank: Recent Paintings brings together a series of new paintings which, with the fervour of minimal gesture, extend his ongoing science-like practice.
In recent years Frank has cited five seemingly disparate artists as influential in the development of his early artistic practice and thinking - English artists, Dorian Gray and Turner; the Spanish artists, Goya and Velazquez and American artist, Robert Ryman. This series of paintings can be seen as an acknowledgement and consolidation of these influences.
With a career spanning over thirty years Frank is one of Australias foremost contemporary painters. His work was recently included in The 2010 Biennale of Sydney The Beauty of Distance, Songs of Survival in a Precarious Age, curated by David Elliott. Highlights of his career include inclusion in Contemporary Australia: Optimism at the Queensland Art Gallery / Gallery of Modern Art (2008) and the 8th Biennale of Sydney, curated by Rene Block (1990). A major retrospective of his work was held at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney (2000) and in 2005 Frank won The Arthur Guy Memorial Painting Prize at the Bendigo Art Gallery, Victoria. A major new monograph on Franks work So Far: the Art of Dale Frank 2005-1980 was published in 2007. His work is held in all public collections in Australia and in numerous private and corporate collections in Australia, Europe and the United States.
