Annual Duldig Lecture

The annual Duldig Lecture for 2019 will be presented by Dr Jane Eckett on the subject:

Preserve or perish: posthumous casts and the challenges of sculptors’ estates Honouring an artist’s final wishes with respect to their studio contents is a daunting task, but in the case of sculptors’ estates the challenges are exponentially greater still. Which work should be deemed ‘the original’ – the hand-modelled maquette or a unique bronze cast made during the sculptor’s lifetime? If the work was issued as an edition, was the full edition ever realised? And, most problematically of all: what to do with fragile or perishable works that were never cast or fabricated in the artist’s lifetime? Should these be realised in a durable medium posthumously?

If so, how can the sculptor’s intentions be known and respected? Families, executors and dealers representing sculptors’ estates repeatedly face these questions and many more. In this lecture, Jane Eckett will present the perspective of an art historian who has catalogued a number of sculptors’ studios and worked with the representatives of their estates—drawing on, in particular, her experiences in the studio of Norma Redpath (1928–2013).

Dr Jane Eckett is a teaching associate in art history at the University of Melbourne whose research focuses on modernist sculpture and émigré legacies. In 2018, she was appointed the Ursula Hoff Fellow at the Ian Potter Museum of Art and National Gallery of Victoria, focussing on Hirschfeld-Mack’s monotypes. Recent publications include chapters in Bauhaus Diaspora and Beyond (MUP and Power Publications, 2019), Australia Modern (Thames and Hudson, 2019), and Melbourne Modern: European art and design at RMIT since 1945 (RMIT gallery, 2019), the latter which she also co-edited with Harriet Edquist.

The symposium venue is the William Macmahon Ball Theatre in the Old Arts Building (Ground Floor - Room 107) at the University of Melbourn)

This public lecture is a free event, but spaces are limited so please register. For further information: Lyndel Wischer, Museum Director - lyndel@duldig.org.au; or Dr Alison Inglis - asi@unimelb.edu.au

The lecture is organised by the Duldig Studio in association with the University of Melbourne. Inaugurated in 1986 the Annual Duldig Lecture on Sculpture commemorates the life and work of the sculptor Karl Duldig and his wife, the artist and inventor Slawa Horowitz-Duldig.

This year, the Duldig Lecture is the keynote presentation of the symposium Unlocking Creativity: Artists' and Architects' Estates, which has been organised by the Australian Institute of Art History (AIAH), the Melbourne School of Design (MSD) and the Centre of Visual Art (CoVA) at the University of Melbourne. The two-day symposium is a free event, which is taking place from Tuesday 19 November to Wednesday 20 November, 2019.

Image: Norma Redpath studio, Carlton, Victoria, 2013. Photo: Jane Eckett.