Misty moderns: Australian Tonalists 1915–1950

21 February – 27 April 2009 | Project Gallery

Clarice Beckett Hawthorn Tea Gardens c 1936 Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide  Gift of Sir Edward Hayward 1980
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Misty moderns travels to the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, from the Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide.

It is the first major exhibition to tell the story of Australian Tonalism, a movement championed by the influential and often controversial painter Max Meldrum in the first half of the twentieth century. The exhibition is brought together from collections around Australia and includes approximately 80 works of art by Meldrum and his followers. The exhibition features works by Meldrum's best known pupils, Clarice Beckett, Percy Leason and Colin Colahan, as well as formative works by Australian Modernists Roy de Maistre, Roland Wakelin, Lloyd Rees, Arnold Shore and William Frater.

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