Ethel Carrick and Anne Dangar are some of Australia’s most influential female artists from the early 1900s, but their impact on Australian art is relatively unknown.
That’s why the National Gallery is celebrating both these talents with Ethel Carrick | Anne Dangar, side-by-side retrospectives kicking off this summer in Canberra.
Ethel Carrick (1872‒1952) was a gifted painter and an intrepid traveller, who was among the first artists to introduce Australia to a post-impressionist approach.
While she was born in the UK, Ethel spent most of her life living and exhibiting in Australia alongside her husband, Australian Impressionist painter E. Phillips Fox — whose own reputation at times overshadowed her work during her lifetime.
‘Although there have been impressive exhibitions showing their work together, this retrospective features 140 works, allowing a clear view of her artistic oeuvre in its own right. From the earlier radical paintings that formed her reputation through to her later, great paintings of Nice, as well as the more discursive, diaristic works created during her journeys to different parts of the globe,’ says Australian art head curator, Dr Deborah Hart.
She describes the exhibition as a ‘deep dive’ into Ethel’s five-decade-long career, revealing the beauty of her colourful, vivid paintings and the way she captured public life.
Meanwhile, Anne Dangar (1885‒1951) is one of Australia’s most significant modern artists who started out as a painter, before forging new ground exploring Cubism in her bold pottery.
In 1930, she moved from New South Wales to France, joining the artist community Moly-Sabata and dedicated herself to Cubism, making her one of the only Australian artists to meaningfully contribute to the famous movement.
‘She was first and foremost a cubist, a painter and potter second,’ Anne Dangar curator Dr Rebecca Edwards says, noting how Anne’s unique aesthetic combined modern art with traditional craft.
‘She united rustic French pottery with cubism, making it accessible to all. The circular forms of pottery — plates, bowls, tubular candlesticks and wide-bellied vessels such as vases and tureens — were ideal supports for small, cubist compositions,’ Rebecca adds.
More than 180 objects, ranging from textiles, to paintings, and of course ceramics, are on show for the exhibition, created by Anne or the leading artists in her circle.
Despite working across different mediums and art styles, Ethel Carrick and Anne Dangar are united in their power of their little-known legacies that are beginning to get the recognition they deserve.
Both women pushed against the grain, found inspiration far from home, and influenced the course of Australian abstraction — even long after their lifetimes.
Ethel Carrick | Anne Dangar is on at the National Gallery of Australia in Canberra from December 7 until April 27 2025. Free entry.
